


dark lord took away my sun today (took away my boy forever)

by traumatic



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Abandonment, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Anxiety, Canonical Character Death, Depression, Drinking, Eating Disorders, Enemies to Friends, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fake Character Death, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Lonely Harry, M/M, Marijuana, Mental Health Issues, Mild Sexual Content, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Nihilism, Patronus Charm (Harry Potter), Post-Battle of Hogwarts, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-War, Questioning, Recovery, Slow Build, Smoking, Survivor Guilt, The Marauder's Map, assumed death?, or more like mistaken character death?, towards the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:54:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 40,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21928546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/traumatic/pseuds/traumatic
Summary: 8th year students have a new and challenging task set forth in order to graduate Hogwarts. No longer are there exams to study for or essays to write, not for the few who return at least. Instead, they must prepare individually for a weekend spent wandering the forbidden forest with only themselves and their knowledge to keep them safe.Or where Headmistress McGonagall was outvoted during a meeting to set standards for the returning eighth years. Everyone's still grieving the losses of the war, but Harry and Draco are the only ones doing it alone.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 42
Kudos: 307





	1. reckoning

**Author's Note:**

> Title's from Unforgivable Curse #3 by McCafferty. I wanted to call this fic that, but I was worried it might look like this was 1 of 3 parts or smth confusing so here this is!
> 
> (Wanted to preface this with the fact that there's never any reason to be transphobic and it's absolutely unacceptable. i don't care if you're world famous, a billionaire, or a "feminist". If your feminism doesnt include trans people, it isn't feminism! trans people have rights, are real people, and are entirely valid!)

Harry hadn’t planned on returning to repeat his seventh year at Hogwarts, on coming back to those hallways of horror, reliving the moments of his friends’ deaths, feeling the ache of fear, the bite of panic. 

He hasn’t been doing so well mentally, has truly been falling apart, and he can’t even imagine Hogwarts of all places will make him feel better, so he doesn’t even respond to the Letter in the mail. Leaves it sitting on the counter of the muggle hotel room he’s been renting, opened and only half read. 

Somehow, though, he ends up there anyway, pulling his trunk through Platform 9¾, with Ron at his side. He’s not sure how it’s going to affect either of them, seeing spots where their friends and family died, but he’s going to try and deal with it. 

After all, he can’t run from his past anymore than he could run from his future. 

He lugs his trunk up and onto the train as Ginny asks Ron about what he’s heard of the new 8th year changes. 

Harry's heard those rumours, of course, but what use is listening to hogwash when he’ll find out the truth soon enough? So he pushes on and tries to find them a semi-empty car. 

Eventually, he begins to wish he’d never come, never left that shitty muggle hotel room in London, because more people than he can count start to jeer at him. Clap for him. Ask for autographs. Take photographs of him. Try to touch the “saviour of the wizarding world” without even asking his permission. 

The thought of signing his name for fame, of posing for photographs, after all those people fucking died makes him literally, physically ill, so he just pretends he can’t hear them as they shout after him and beg for his attention. Feels faint as he pushes past the disposable Muggle cameras and the quills in his face to find Hermione in her own car with Neville and Luna. 

“Fucking hell,” Harry says in exhaustion when the door finally shuts between him and the others. “Why did I come back?” 

“Because McGonagall asked you to,” Hermione says gently, “and because you didn’t want You-Know-Who to ruin one more thing in your life.” 

“He’s dead, 'Mione. You can say his name.” 

“Voldemort, then.” She is noticeably tense and Neville’s cheeks are pink in leftover fear of a dead man; Luna is too busy reading a small, baby-pink book and doesn’t even look up. 

“Do you think it’ll calm down? All the...hullabaloo.”

“Perhaps. With what McGonagall has planned, though, it might just get worse.” 

Harry sighs, exhausted, as Ron and Ginny push their way into the car, trunks in tow. 

* * *

Headmistress McGonagall is no different than Professor McGonagall. She’s still tall and smart and one of Harry’s few remaining friends. She leads the Sorting Ceremony with grace and efficiency that Harry’s come to realize she just naturally possesses. 

After the ceremony, she sends the first through seventh years away so she can speak privately with the few eighth years who have actually returned. There’s not many of them— besides Harry and his friends, only five or so more show up— but it’s enough to elicit new rules and curriculum apparently. 

“This year,” the Headmistress starts to say, “will be a little bit different. I was...The rules were predetermined by some of the specialists at the Ministry of Magic. I had some input, but they considered all the facts and made their own conclusions on what might be best for you as a whole.” 

That doesn’t sound good. The Ministry had their incompetent hands in Hogwarts' curriculum? Merlin…help them. Harry’ll be back in that fucking maze again if it’s up to them. 

“So, you will be assigned your own special eighth year dormitory that will be mixed-House. Hate speech and bullying will not be tolerated and any evidence of bullying will lead to immediate suspension. There are wardings in place to inhibit violence against one another. I will not have a divided student body again.” 

Harry agrees with that. Dumbledore may have done some good things for the Wizarding World, but Harry wishes he hadn’t ignored the separation Houses sometimes lead to. The divide of competition sometimes goes too far.

He’s glad McGonagall is addressing it. 

“Next are the qualifications to graduate. The Ministry have decided to assign a graduation requirement this year in place of final exams. Instead of taking NEWTS, you will prove your knowledge at the end of term…” She pauses to look over at her peers with something akin to disdain and sighs, continuing, “by spending an entire weekend in the forbidden forest. You will only have your wand and some basic potion ingredients to survive with. You will take classes to help you prepare, but your course load will be considerably less, as you should have most of the knowledge by now.” 

Harry’s jaw drops, his tongue goes numb, his palms start to sweat, he shivers. Back to the forest. Back to green light and Avada Kedavra and Hagrid’s hard sobs. Back to Malfoy’s mother’s blessed lie and Harry's paralyzed back on the cold, wet ground. 

He meets the Headmistress’ forlorn eyes and knows she fought to avoid this, fought to have them take their NEWTS like they were supposed to. Fought to keep Harry’s body off the hard, damp ground. 

Hermione’s hand is on his arm and Ron’s got this look in his eyes like he can hear Harry’s plans to run the fuck away, back to Muggle London where he should’ve stayed in the first place. He could do it. _Accio_ his broom and fly away with explaining himself to anyone ever again. Live a quiet life as a muggle, work a menial job. 

“Harry,” Luna says softly, “are you okay?” 

No no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no

Harry feels his fear like a bezoar at the back of his throat, gagging him, suffocating him, killing him. “Of course.” 

“You will be assigned a partner from a different House, assuming we have enough students to do so, who will be your partner all year. You will share a dorm and you will study together. Your partner will be your only assistance in the forest with you, so make friends if you aren’t already.” 

Harry looks around at the other eighth years and swallows hard. Who will he be stuck with? Who will have to pick up the pieces when he inevitably falls apart just through the tree line?

Besides the Gryffindors, there’s Luna, Hannah Abbot, Michael Corner, Pansy Parkinson, Susan Bones, and Draco Malfoy. 

He hopes Luna’s his partner. After all, she’s the one he’s closest to from a different house. Plus, he enjoys her bable of weird, obscure creatures and places. It might even come in handy in the Forbidden Forest which will surely be well stocked with strange beings and plants. 

“I will be around to assist you, as will the other professors, in preparing you for your weekend, but your Head of House, so to speak, will be Professor Trelawney. More rules will be published as the ministry decides on them, so please await further instructions. Now, as for your partners, the list goes as follows…” 

Ron ends up with Michael Corner, Hermione with Susan Bones, and Harry? He ends up with Draco Malfoy.

Harry turns quickly to look at Malfoy from across the room. Whatever fight they’d had before the war had been squashed when he testified on his behalf during the Malfoy trials and managed to get him and his mother out of Azkaban. His father, who maintained his loyalty to Voldemort up until his cowardly last minutes, was sentenced to a quick and efficient Kiss to end his life. 

Draco looks back, just for a second, and Harry raises his eyebrows once. Draco tilts the corner of his mouth and returns his gaze to Headmistress McGonagall. It feels like acceptance, like Draco’s not going to be an arse about being partnered up, and Harry’s grateful. 

“Now you will head to your dormitories! Oh, and your Houses will still accrue points based on your actions, so be smart and act appropriately! Your younger housemates will hold you accountable, I’m sure.” 

* * *

The new Common Room is sort of plain, Harry thinks, in comparison to the Gryffindor one. It doesn’t have the history of books on tables and feet on couches and bright gold paint cracked in corners with age. It is brand new, never used, and embellished with a rainbow of House colours. 

There are four banners of the same size hung up to commemorate where they came from and who they are and how they got here. The pillows on the couches are a mix of tones and shapes.

Harry’s relieved to be in a place with no bad memories, though, with nothing causing anxiety to flare up in his chest, and he can see relief on the faces of some of the others, as well. 

“Lovely,” Luna says genuinely, heading for the nook by a tall, clear window. “Perfect spot for _Freadle_ watching.” 

“What the hell are _Freadles?”_ Asks Luna’s partner, Pansy, settling down across from her on the bench with a somewhat annoyed look and exasperated breath. 

Harry turns to his friends who are looking around the room in various emotional states. No one looks quite as upset, though, as Malfoy, whose skin is pinched in between his eyebrows and around his mouth. 

Harry tries not to think about it, but he can’t help but wonder if Malfoy’s upset to share a common room with dirty blood. Upset at having to settle for a space that is less than pure. 

“Lovely,” Malfoy says at Harry’s side. “Love the idea of going to die in a forest where we’ve already almost died.” 

“I did actually die,” Harry says in response, dead-pan. “I was dead.” 

“I know.” 

“And yet _that’s_ the icebreaker you’re gonna go with?” Harry’s half-smiling, but the action exhausts him, so it slips from his face as Draco shrugs. “Wanna go see our room?” 

Malfoy lifts an elegant eyebrow and moves forward, up the brand new stairs and down a long corridor. Harry sees doors, but none say their names until the last one on the right. 

Malfoy pushes open the door and inside is simple and efficient. Their trunks are already placed at the ends of two new beds with knitted blankets on top, woven with all the house colours, and there are windows at the head of each bed. There’s a carpet in the center of the room, embroidered with a new motto: on est tous unis sous Hogwarts . 

We are all united under Hogwarts. 

McGonagall is really trying her best and Harry is here for it. 

“Lovely,” Draco says pleasantly, opening the window to let in the cool, September breeze. 

“There’s something you should know,” Harry says awkwardly. “I...I sort of have these godawful night terrors now...and...and I can’t really help it, so if I’m loud or whatever...just toss a pillow at me or something. Wake me up.” 

Malfoy looks like he’s going to say something mean, but his face changes at the last second. 

“Alright...You’ll do the same, I presume, if I’m keeping you awake?” 

“You get them, too?” 

“They probably aren’t the same, but...yes.” 

Harry’s relieved that he’s not the only one with pieces of the war trapped in his chest like shards of glass. His friends all seem okay for the most part, grieving yes, but not stuck in the loop of war like Harry is. Losing Fred was awful and terrible and so tragic, but Ron is outwardly okay. He doesn’t have dark circles under his eyes or hollows in his cheeks or shake in fear. The only one who’s not okay on the outside is George, but that’s to be expected. 

He lost his best friend as well as his brother. 

“Good thing I do a sick _Muffliato_ , then,” Harry says with as much amusement as he can muster. “Also I sing in the shower.” 

“Brilliant. What, pray tell, do you sing?” 

“All kinds of stuff. The Weird Sisters, Britney Spears, Smashmouth. Good shit, you know?” 

“I only recognize one of those things. Who’s Britney Smears?” 

“Spears. You’ll love her.” Harry’s smile is real now, because he’s laughing. 

He hasn’t really laughed in such a long time that he never wants to stop. Draco’s giving him this look like he’s half cracked, and maybe he is. Maybe he has been for a long time and no one around him has had the heart to tell him.

“Also…” Harry turns around suddenly to dig rapidly through his trunk until he comes up with a thin, wooden stick. “Here.” 

“My wand? You...kept it?” 

“What else was I s’posed to do with it? _Use it?_ It’s not mine.” 

“It’s not mine either...not anymore. You...You won it fair and square, remember?” 

Harry looks down at it, at the surprisingly gentle hold he has on it, and shrugs. Couldn’t give less of a shit about having Draco’s wand, about winning it, about keeping it. 

“Then take it back.” 

Draco’s eyebrows rise up far on his forehead and Harry almost grins. But then he remembers the look in Draco’s eyes on the night Dumbledore died and the grin passes. His brief amusement fades even quicker than it arrived. 

“You want me to fight you? Under McGonagall’s new unity wards?” 

“What’s the worst that happens?” 

“I get kicked out of school and sent to Azkaban for attacking the twat who saved my life, that’s what.” 

Harry rolls his eyes and levels the wand at Draco’s chest, takes a deep breath, and recites, _“Cantis,”_ so Draco has to defend himself. 

When he does, he does so wandlessly. Harry doesn’t know if he didn’t bring one with him or if he got a new one, but he has yet to see it. 

He brushes the jinx off easily and then casts, _“Expelliarmus,”_ which Harry allows to hit him. He feels it on his skin like bugs and then Draco’s wand flies off towards him. He picks it up and stares at it in his thin, pale hand. 

“Thanks, Potter.”

“Call me Harry, alright? I think we’ve seen enough shit that we can call each other by our first names.” 

Draco’s eyes dart to Harry’s as if making sure he’s sincere. Harry’s never met anyone as cautious, as hesitant, as he is. It’s sort of refreshing, in a way, to meet someone who doesn’t trust anyone like Harry no longer trusts anyone. 

“Harry, then.” He sounds uncomfortable. 

“Awesome,” Harry says, thinking about that day all the time ago when Draco offered Harry his hand in friendship and Harry had brushed him off, “Draco.” 

* * *

Harry rather enjoys the lighter course load, if he’s being honest. He has so much free time now to not sleep and to wake up screaming from nightmares when he does and to go days without dinner because he’s repulsed by the thought of eating when so many people are dead and their bodies were laid upon the stone in the Great Hall where he sits. He has so many hours to fill with empty stares and meaningless words and the feeling that nothing really matters anyway, so why keep trying? He loves enjoying time by himself and time spent silently tiptoeing around Malfoy because they’re both apparently so fucked up that they scream bloody murder in the middle of the night. 

Harry doesn’t know what haunts Draco, not exactly, but he imagines there’s at least one familiar character in both of their nightmares. And his name isn’t Severus Snape. 

Harry’s friends don’t really know what to do with him, so instead of talking about his dark circles or the way his shirts, which had once fit, now hang off his shoulders, or the gauntness of his cheeks, they ignore it. Talk about the new Weird Sisters album or that Muggle football player who is getting international recognition or whatever. 

Harry hates Muggle football, so he doesn’t give a fuck about whoever it is and he doesn’t pretend to. In fact, he sort of stops seeing his friends all together. He spends a lot of time smoking cigarettes off of the old astronomy tower balcony by himself, shivering against the memories of death and decay, and rotting the lungs out of his chest one breath at a time. 

McGonagall had an entire new tower built for Trelawney and everyone else, but decided to keep this as a memorial to her good friend, Albus. It’s supposed to be off limits, because the structure is crumbling and the foundation is cracked and magic is the only thing still keeping it upright, but Harry’s yet to be yelled at for going inside. Probably because they think he’s there to honour Dumbledore’s memory or something.

Old Harry, Pre-War Harry, might have done just that here. But this Harry? This broken, battered thing with as many wounds as a dart board Harry? He doesn’t give a fuck about Albus’ memory. 

He just wants some peace and fucking quiet. 

Draco’s as quiet as a church mouse most of the time now, so Harry doesn’t have to worry about fights or angry words or his stupid entitlement. He doesn’t really talk to anyone besides Pansy and he, too, is looking worse for wear. 

Skinny as hell, shadowed in exhaustion. As frail as the skeletons of all their dead classmates buried 10 feet underground. 

No one interferes with either of their downward spirals. No one asks, no one tells. Harry and Draco are just two more casualties in the war that, apparently, will never end. Not for them. 

So they sort of become friends, in a weird way. Partners, as McGonagall had said on their first day of 8th year, in their descent to hell. 

When Harry goes to smoke on the Astronomy Tower balcony with his legs dangling over the edge into oblivion, Draco comes, too. They just sit there beside one another, two skeletons on the edge of death, remembering all the horrible things they did just to make it this far. 

Harry isn’t sure it’s helping either of them, really, but he feels calmer in Draco’s presence, like he’s the Astronomy Tower, only just barely stopped from crumbling to pieces by a couple of enchantments that Draco somehow always remembers to cast. 

* * *

Draco’s screaming. He’s screaming and thrashing and Harry’s awake, staring up at the ceiling, because he can’t bring himself to get up. He can’t see anything in the darkness but the glint of his glasses on his bedside table, so he reaches for them, puts them on. Stands up. 

His body is exhausted, but he knows Draco’s done this for him, so he has to wake him up. There’s no way around it. 

“Draco,” Harry whispers, not touching him as to not startle him even more. “It’s just a dream. Wake up.” 

When Draco cries out again, Harry says his name a little louder. Harsher. Starts to worry. 

“Draco!” He still doesn’t touch him, doesn’t want to startle him too badly, but it’s inevitable. 

He knows it is, because it has been since the start of term. 

“Draco,” Harry touches his arm gently, “it’s okay. It’s just a dream.” 

He tries his best to sound calm, to sound gentle, but it isn’t easy when he’s panicking like this. When he’s standing over someone who used to be his nemesis but is now the exact type of person Harry was born to protect. 

“Draco, go back to sleep.” 

Draco settles down a little, but his eyebrows are still furrowed and his hands still clutch at his sheets with white knuckles. He’s panting and sweating and confused and afraid. 

“It’s okay. You’re here now. You’re...You’re safe.” 

“Potter?” Draco’s eyes open gently and there are tears on his face. “Was I…?” 

“Yeah...but you’re good now.” 

He’s probably done this for Harry, too. It’s just Harry makes it a habit to try and forget all of his dreams, whenever he has them, so he doesn’t remember the horrors of his nightmares. He wishes there was a spell for that. 

“Thanks.” 

“‘Course. You do the same.” 

“You've heard me?” 

“No, but I assumed.” 

“I’m sorry.” 

Harry sighs gently, fatigued even by standing beside Draco’s bed, and nods. 

“Me, too.”

“Will you…Nevermind.” 

“What?” Harry rests his hand on Draco’s bedpost to steady himself. 

He feels faint, like he might tip over if the wind blows a little too hard. Like his vision might go black if he sits down too quickly. Maybe he should eat something, except he isn’t hungry. He never is anymore. 

“Will you stay with me?” 

Harry thinks about it for only a second before he lifts his knee to settle down beside Draco, too exhausted to consider the implications. He draws the blanket up to his chin and looks up at the ceiling, feeling relief and pain like two crossed waves crashing up against one another. 

There’re stars up on the ceiling, real constellations like the ones in the skies, that McGonagall must have charmed up there. He thinks of Sirius and how his namesake came from the stars and how he’s gone like the star is, too. How everything has an end, even things that may be otherwise thought of as infinite. Eternal. Immortal. 

“What are you thinking about?” Draco asks. 

“Stars.” 

Harry’s voice is nothing, not even a whisper. He is just so tired. He can’t do it anymore, can’t pretend to hold his shit together for one second longer. He turns his head away from Draco’s gentle, quiet eyes and he sobs. 

He curls around himself, arms to his chest, and he shakes with waves of tears like a tsunami destroying anything in its path. Like a hurricane bashing a coast to pieces. A tornado tearing shit up and dropping it thousands of kilometres away. 

Everyone he loves that is dead died because of him. Remus and Sirius and Tonks and Fred and Colin and Harry’s mum and dad. They all died because of him, because he was the saviour of the wizarding world. 

Draco pauses beside Harry, just letting him cry, and then he touches Harry’s shoulder. Turns him onto his back. 

Harry goes willingly, pliant in the face of the truth, as his mind breaks like his body has. As he drowns in his own violent waves. 

“Harry,” he says softly, “what’s wrong?” 

“I just—I can’t.”

Draco doesn’t ask what Harry can’t do, because he probably gets it. Is probably in the same set of mind. 

“Okay.” 

And then he takes Harry’s hand. Holds it between his and squeezes enough that Harry knows he isn’t alone as he cries. 

He cries himself to sleep that night, clutching Draco’s cold, thin hands like lifelines. And when he wakes a couple hours later from a chaotic, entropic nightmare, Draco’s fallen asleep with his head on Harry’s boney shoulder with Harry’s hand still gripped tightly between his own. 


	2. recovery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying to be integrative with the fact this happened in the late 90s, but I was born in '98, so my approximations are all I have! Don't mind anything too much. Also I'm not British, so I have no idea what weed sells for over there or the names you guys had for it in the late 90s, so I'm using equivalencies and best guesses. Enjoy!

It sort of becomes a thing. 

Harry and Draco don’t talk about it, don’t even mention it when they wake in the mornings, just go to their Potions class and sit solemnly next to each other. It’s good. It keeps Harry sane, at least, considering Draco seems to be the only person interested in being around him. 

He doesn’t know what to say to Ron and Hermione anymore and, apparently, they don’t know what to say to him either. It’s not even their fault, not completely, but he’s just not okay as a person right now and he can’t be around people that are. And they are, at least outwardly.

He overhears Hermione telling Luna about how she and Ron flew all the way to Australia to remind her parents of who she is and he wonders when she did this. Why hadn’t she told Harry? 

Then he sees a silver band on Hermione’s finger and knows Ron must have asked her to marry her in his post-war, Voldemort-is-dead bliss without even telling Harry about it. 

He decides then that maybe a friendship works both ways. 

He spends his time studying with Draco, Luna, and Pansy, because they’re the only people who don’t seem to give a shit if Harry’s a person right now. 

Luna just wants to show Harry photographs of her Narkskulls or whatever and Pansy wants to master making antidotes from scratch for the venomous beings out in the Forbidden Forest. That’s all Harry has to do and be when he’s around them and he can do that most days. 

Christmas comes around and Draco goes home to his mother, leaving Harry pretty much alone for the holiday. Then Luna and Pansy go, too, so he really _is_ alone.

He sneaks out into Hogsmeade just after dinner to Apparate into Muggle London. He’s looking for something a little stronger than his cigarettes tonight and he finds it in an old friend. 

Well, he supposes, friend is not the word he would use to describe him. His cousin, Dudley, knows this guy who sells alright weed for a good price, so he buys some and Disapparates as soon as the kid’s back is turned. Dudley watches him with wide, fearful eyes as he disappears and the sight brings some satisfaction to Harry’s life, if only for a second. 

He packs a bowl at the top of the Old Astronomy Tower and then promptly smokes the entire thing, feeling like he weighs a tonne and nothing at the same time. Then he stands on the edge of the crumbling building and kicks some rocks down. Contemplates what would happen to him if he fell that far. 

Broken bones, surely, but death? Who knows. 

The rocks shatter and then scatter against the ground, too far for Harry to see, and he sighs. He sighs for a long time, turns around, and then walks all the way back downstairs before he does something he might regret. 

When he arrives at his room, he finds Ron sitting on the foot of his bed, empty pack of cigarettes clutched in one fist. 

“Harry,” he says firmly, “let’s go.” 

“What?” He’s too high for this. 

Instantly, he knows this.

“Let’s go. You’re coming home with me.” 

“No, no. It’s okay.” Harry’s breath starts to pick up. 

He can’t go back to the Burrow! Not yet. Not yet! He’s not ready. 

He can’t bear to see the fucking clock or the look on George’s face or the pain in Ginny’s eyes or the empty fucking chair at the dining room table! Harry is not okay and this will only make it worse! 

He has to come up with a lie. A lie. He can do that.

“I’m going to Draco’s. It’s okay, okay? I just. I needed some time to myself. I’m taking Apparating in the morning.”

“You _reek_ of marijuana, Harry!” 

“How do you even know what that is?!” 

“Hermione’s been showing me around Muggle London and she explained it to me. Now go pack up your trunk and let’s go.” 

“No! I’m fine, Ron, alright?” 

Harry is shaking now, just a little. Maybe it’s from the weed or the panic or the anxiety, but he can’t stop the trembling in his hands. Ron's cheeks are red with impatience and fury. 

“I’m gonna leave for Malfoy’s now, okay? Tell Mr. and Mrs. Weasley I miss them. Tell Ginny and...and George Happy Christmas, alright? I’ll see you in the new year.” 

Somehow, Ron lets him go. He gives him a hug, tries to tease him about the slight beard he’s got going on from not shaving, and says he’ll send the gifts over to Malfoy’s this time. Says he loves him and then sends him on his way. 

Harry wants to die. He’d throw up if he had anything to puke up but coffee and smoke. 

Then he Owls Malfoy by sending the fastest Owl in the owlery and waits impatiently and anxiously for his reply while he thinks about Hedwig’s wide white wings. 

_Don’t worry; I got you. But in case you do get lonely, feel free to come join us at the manor. Mother says she would love to see you and hope you can make it before dinner tomorrow evening. Feel free, even, to come tonight. Wear your Sunday best._

_Cheers,_

D. M.

Well, it’s decided. Harry packs up his pajamas and his weed before he sneaks out into Hogsmeade to Apparate into the Malfoy’s living room. It doesn’t even occur to him to Floo, because he can’t seem to do that anymore. He’d rather walk his arse all the way to Hogsmeade than smell the dust and the soot one more time, feel the warmth and see the green light, even if he could get to Malfoy manor quickly. 

Thankfully, after the dementor’s Kiss, Narcissa sold the old Malfoy manor and now they live in a smaller, equally as grandiose castle rather close to Hogsmeade, making Apparating easier. There are no awful, traumatic memories melted into the floorboards here. There is no blood, no death, no tears. There is no Voldemort. Not here.

When he arrives, Draco is waiting for him in a maroon arm chair reading a book with his legs crossed. He looks better, has more colour to his face. This is what a happy home can do for some people— it can bring them back to life. 

Harry only wishes he had a home to return to to do that for him, but he hasn’t had a home ever. Why would the universe suddenly grant him one now after everything he’s done? After all the people he’s gotten killed? 

“I expected you’d Floo here, to be honest.” Draco puts his book down to stand up.

Harry flinches, thinking of the Floo in Umbridge’s old office, of Aberdeen in the glass mirror, of Sirius. 

“Decided to Apparate. Hope you don’t mind.” 

“Well, you’re just in time—” 

Draco’s mother interrupts him as she comes rushing into the room to smile at Harry. 

Suddenly, as if struck by the truth, Harry remembers he probably still reeks of weed. He should probably use a spell or something to get rid of it before either of them notices that he’s still high as fuck. Maybe when they have their backs turned he can use a _Freskatu_ to cover it up. 

“It’s good to see you, Harry,” she says, looking like she really means it. “Have you and Draco been on the same diet? You’re both scarily thin.”

He has to check to make sure she’s joking—she is—and then he fakes a smile. Draco’s doing the same thing, looking uncomfortable, but she doesn’t notice. 

Adults, Harry thinks. So oblivious to what’s right in front of their faces. 

“Come on,” she says softly. “I’ve set you up in the guest room.” 

* * *

Harry spends the later portion of the evening in Draco Malfoy’s kitchen with him and his mum, rolling out dough and popping trays in the oven. It’s a nice, distracting task and it brings Harry some contentment. Some peace of mind. 

“Where do you usually spend Christmas, Harry?” Narcissa asks as she pours sugar into a bowl. 

“At the Weasley’s.” 

“Not this year?” 

“I just...I didn’t want to not see Fred there, you know?” He avoids the sad look she gives him by pressing a cutter into the dough forcefully. “Didn’t want to sit next to the empty chair that was always his.” 

He misses everyone so wholly that he has to stop for a second to recover. He wants to see Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, wants to go back to the Burrow and fit back in like a missing piece into a puzzle, but knows he can’t burden them with whatever is fucking wrong with him. He won’t do that to them after what they’ve gone through. After losing Fred, after George's wounds that won’t even really heal, after all that pain Harry himself has caused them. 

“Well, you’re always welcome here.” 

“Thank you, Mrs. Malfoy.” 

“Call me Narcissa, alright? No need for formalities anymore.” 

Harry nods, flashing a fake smile, and remembers the bravery in her voice when she lied to the face of the world's biggest threat. When she helped him take down Voldemort with a couple of words. And then he goes back to cutting shapes out of his gingerbread dough. 

“Mother, do you remember that Muggle song you used to sing to me? For Christmas?” Draco has this look in his eyes that makes Harry want to want to smile. 

Something innocent and happy. 

“Could you?” 

Narcissa sighs a little dramatically and pats him on the hand, smudging him with flour. 

“Fine.” 

She washes her hands at the sink, smiling down at the drain, and then she walks out into the next room. Harry’s still pressing out little men in gingerbread and piling them messily on metal sheets, but he’s curious. And then the music starts. 

It’s a Christmas song Harry recognizes from his time with his aunt and uncle. They’d hated its presence in stores and things because it’s slower, softer. Not as on the nose as others. Harry's always had a soft spot for any and all Christmas music, so he loves it.

 _“I’ve heard there was a secret chord…”_ She has a lovely singing voice. 

Harry stops fiddling with the dough to just listen to her. Listen to the building of the song, of the piano, of her voice. It’s so beautiful and peaceful. 

He leans back against the counter and holds his hands, clasped together, to his chest as he feels nothing and everything all at once. 

“Beautiful,” he says and Draco takes one of his hands, like he does when they’re both awake from nightmares. 

“I know. It used to feel so...so happy. Now all I can think about is how forlorn it is.” 

Harry agrees wholeheartedly, squeezing Draco's fingers. She finishes singing and playing, but starts up another song. Something Harry doesn’t recognize. 

“You don’t know it?” Draco’s looking up at him. “Muggles don’t have this one?” 

“Or maybe I just didn’t. I, uh, didn’t get out much as a kid.” 

“Your family didn’t play Christmas music?” 

Harry diverts his eyes and sighs. Says, “Family isn’t the word I’d use to describe them...but no, not really.” 

Christmases were days Harry spent locked up in the closet until he was brought out to cook dinner. Afterwards, he’d be forced to return to his room as the Dursleys ate their dinner, left only with the smell of the Christmas ham to eat that night. 

“No? Why?”

“You’re trying to dig up my complicated backstory, but it won’t work. Not right now anyway.” 

“Always worth a try, Potter,” Draco says with a smirk. “Tell me about it sometime?” 

Harry pauses, listens as the song builds and falls. Then sighs. 

“I slept in a closet underneath the stairs that my aunt and uncle locked when they didn’t want to see me, which was most of the time. Sometimes they’d forget to feed me for days. My cousin was significantly larger than I was, and yet I still got his hand me downs. When I came to Hogwarts, those were the only new pair of clothes I’d ever gotten before.” 

“Oh, my God.” 

“They didn’t like how messy my hair was, so they shaved it off in patches. Thankfully, magic grew it back overnight, but that only pissed them off more. Locked me up for days for that one.” 

Draco’s face is shocked and strangely worried. Like he’s afraid Harry’s going to go back to them or something, but he would never do that. He’d rather sleep in a gutter than go back to that tiny box of a room, to the hours spent cleaning, to never being good enough. 

“That’s disgusting,” Draco says and there’s anger in his eyes. “How could they do that to a kid? An innocent baby who they chose to bring into their home?” 

“I don’t know...but I don’t really want to talk about it anymore, okay? It kinda ruins the Christmas spirit.” 

Draco nods and Narcissa changes songs again, to a more upbeat rhythm with words about a bright nosed deer and foggy nights. 

“Let’s get baking, then,” Draco says suddenly. “Mother’ll have a fit if we don’t get these done before bedtime.” 

* * *

The guest room is the most beautiful room Harry has ever slept in. It’s decorated lavishly and expensively and is somehow also functional. 

Harry’s come to realize that most expensive things aren’t useful or don’t work properly, so he expects the bed to be hard and unforgiving, but it’s nice. Soft. He still doesn’t sleep, though. 

At around 2, Malfoy comes sneaking into Harry’s room with an odd look on his face. 

“I can’t sleep,” he pronounces as he falls into a chair near the bed, basically saying he missed Harry's presence. “I’ve spent three months listening to someone else breathe and talk and stuff and the silence is deafening.” 

“Agreed.” Harry missed him, too, is what that means. “Wanna try something?” 

“Sure.” 

And then Harry shows Draco Malfoy how to pack a bowl in a castle at half two in the bloody morning. And then he shows him how to smoke it from the balcony of an expensive room in the bitter cold with only the tip of his wand to light it. 

_Incendio_ can be a useful spell, but not for this. Harry prefers _Chama_ for this and other small-flamed purposes. 

“What do the Muggles call it again? Mari-Mari…?” 

“Marijuana. Or Maryjane, in code."

“Marijuana. Is it popular for Muggles to get high?” 

“Popular isn’t the word I’d use, no. It’s actually illegal.”

Harry has to laugh at the appalled look on Draco’s face. As if he’s ever minded what was illegal before! As if Harry has! 

“Muggles break their laws?!” 

Harry laughs so hard tears spring to his eyes. He rolls a little on the balcony floor, almost dropping the bowl over the edge, and laughs again. 

It feels so good just to laugh! He can’t imagine why people don’t laugh all the time. Hermione would say it releases endorphins or dopamine or something scientific like that if she were here and still speaking to Harry.

“That is so bizarre! What other kind of laws do they have?” 

“It’s illegal to play Knock Out Ginger. Do you have that game?” 

“You mean ding dong ditch?” Malfoy’s grinning. “The wizards have a rule like that, too. Expect a summons from the Ministry for using the spell to ring the doorbell and a suspension for a week against foolish magic.” 

“How ridiculous!” Harry can’t stop, won’t stop. “People are so weird.” 

The wind blows harshly, but Harry doesn’t care. Just leans in a little further to Draco’s side to huddle for warmth. He wishes for a blanket, but doesn’t mind not having one. 

“I want a biscuit,” Draco announces suddenly. “A biscuit and some tea.” 

“Biscuits sound so good right now. Let’s go.” 

Draco leads Harry through the winding hallways of his newest home to the kitchen where they gorge on decorated gingerbread men and hot tea. They laugh when the Malfoy’s newest house guest enters to check on the ruckus, thinking they’re being burgled, but it’s just them. Patches, who gets paid for tidying, just looks at them, amusement in his eyes and a smile on his face, as he Disapparates right there with a **_Crack!,_ ** leaving them be. 

“Good lad,” Harry says lightly. 

He’s so high. He doesn’t even know what he’s saying and he doesn’t care. It’s so nice to be free of his thoughts for once. A wonderful break. 

“Can I show you something?” Draco asks softly, looking angelic in the refrigerator light. 

“Yeah.”

Draco grins and pulls out his wand, casting _Rechauff,_ a warming charm, over Harry so he stays nice and toasty for what must be an outside adventure. He turns his wand presses it into Harry’s hand so Harry can do one for him. 

He can feel the magic responding to him again, can feel that it remembers him, as he casts _Rechauff._

“Follow me.” 

So Harry follows Draco up the tall, winding staircase and wonders what he’s about to witness. They keep climbing until they’re at the top of the stairs and Harry’s more than a little winded. 

He hasn’t been keeping up his Quidditch figure since McGonagall announced 8th years weren’t allowed to participate, hadn’t felt the need to. 

At least Draco’s in the same boat. 

“I love to sit up here in the Summer,” he says softly, panting a little. “When it’s warm and dark and it smells like rain.” 

Harry nods, continues following Draco through a door and out onto a patio. There are rows and rows of magical plants out here, growing despite the cold because of charms placed on them, glowing under the brilliant winter moon. 

“Oh, my god,” Harry says softly. “This is beautiful.” 

“Sometimes I sit and I draw or write or read. I do a lot of reading, actually, and most of it I do here. In the summer, we have these flowers called _Pluiers_ that my mother grows.”

“What do they look like?” 

“They’re so dark green they’re almost black, and when they open in the middle of summer on cool, dry nights, they release the exact smell of rain after a dry spell. Good for warding and protection spells.” 

“Sounds awesome.” 

“It is. But in the winter, mother grows poinsettias, which are almost as nice.” 

He draws Harry’s attention to a row of bright red and green flowers that he actually recognizes. 

“Awesome,” Harry says, suddenly realizing he’s standing in the middle of a flower bed at 3 am, stoned out of his mind. “Do wizards have the poinsettia song?” 

“No?” 

Harry rolls his eyes, but sings it nonetheless, “Don’t eat a / Poinsettia / If you do / you better / be ready / to get a tummy ache.”

“That’s dumb,” Draco laughs. “Muggles are weird.” 

“Wizards are weird, too.” 

“Not poinsettia weird, though.” 

“...are you kidding?” Harry laughs. “What about Hogwarts’ anthem?”

“Okay, okay. Maybe we’re all weird.” 

Harry’s warm despite the bitter cold thanks to the _Rechauff,_ but he leans against Draco’s arm anyway. Snow starts to fall gently from the sky and Draco wraps an arm around Harry to draw him closer to him. 

“Lovely night,” is all Draco says, smelling of weed and fresh flowers and cold air. 

Harry looks out over the Scottish countryside and sighs gently, not noticing the emptiness in his chest for the first time in a long, long time. Maybe it has something to do with the place or the weed or the boy sitting right beside him, but either way, he feels content. Less like he's still at war. 

“It is,” Harry agrees.


	3. resistance

Christmas morning with the Malfoy’s is just as hectic as Harry thought it might be. Harry feels wired, though he only slept 3 or 4 hours, thanks to a Pepperup Potion that he and Malfoy split after brushing their teeth. 

Narcissa buzzes around like a bee, being the only fully rested wizard in the house, tidying and setting tables and folding napkins while shouting commands at Draco and Harry, who are in charge of charming bouquets of poinsettias into bundles that won’t die for a very long time. It’s quite taxing work, because, if you fuck up the order of them, the bouquet instantly wilts and there’s nothing to be done to salvage it. 

“We open gifts right before everyone shows up,” Malfoy says, working deftly on a set of green flowers with white baby’s breath. “It’s an odd tradition, honestly, but that’s how it is.” 

“I don’t know much about traditions,” Harry admits a little quietly. “Only what the Weasleys did.” 

His aunt and uncle didn’t allow him to participate in their holiday celebrations, so he was either locked away under the stairs or punished with having to watch Dudley receive all of these presents and get nothing himself, not even some of the food he almost single handedly prepared. 

“Well, now you’ll know ours.” Draco finishes the green bouquet and sets it down in a clear vase of water. 

Harry has some difficulty with a bouquet of magical golden flowers in the shape of bells. They won’t stick together no matter how many times he tries the charm and he grows frustrated.

“Fucking hell,” he mumbles, sticking his fingers together instead for the fifth fucking time. “I suck at this.” 

“Not detail oriented then?” Draco wordlessly unsticks Harry’s fingers with his wand and then sticks the flowers together for him. 

Harry’s so grateful for the help. 

“Absolutely not. I am far from the perfectionist you seem to be.”

“A controlling father will do that,” Draco says gently, quietly, like he's ashamed. “I had to compensate by controlling everything else that I could.” 

Harry’s not good at topics like these, wasn’t even before his brain wasn’t fucked, so he just looks at Draco and then looks down to grab another bundle of flowers. He doesn’t know what to say honestly. 

“Almost finished?” Draco’s mum walks past while a dozen or two candlesticks float behind her. "We can start opening gifts when you are." 

Harry and Draco rush through the last few dozen bundles as Narcissa directs decorations to settle down around the room. The house looks amazing by the time she’s finished, glowing and delicate and gorgeous as hell. It’s almost 11, so she directs them into the living room where a fair sized pile of presents sit. 

Some are wrapped in the brilliant gold and red of expensive paper and others are simple and brown, tied up with a twine ribbon. As soon as they’re seated, including Patches who joins at the last second, the presents divide and slide over to their new owners as if by magic. 

Which, well, it is. 

Harry gets a lot of things—a book about something called PTSD that he’ll probably never read, a sweater from Molly with an H, a ticket to a Harpies game from Ginny, and other things from all his 'friends'—but the most peculiar one is from Draco. 

Which, well, Harry never goes into a holiday expecting gifts, but he’s even more surprised than usual when he picks up the shimmery green and gold box. The ribbon is like pure silk and shines in the flickering candlelight. 

Inside are half a dozen potion bottles of varying sizes and colours. He takes the lid off of one and smells—Draught of Peace. He remembers the smell distinctly with the sharp sense of failure. Snape had given him a 0 that day, all for misreading directions. What an dickhead. 

“Potions?” 

“All sleep and anti-anxiety potions. I know you sucked at potions, so I thought I’d brew you some expert ones myself.” 

“Twat.” He’s smiling, though. “Thanks, Draco.” 

Harry watches as Draco peels back the patterned wrapping paper on his next gift—Harry’d picked it up a couple of weeks ago in Muggle London—is a two part gift. A Britney Spears t-shirt that he’d gotten from a tiny store that repurposes old clothes and a Walkman to listen to some Muggle music. 

If there’s one thing the Muggles do perfectly, it’s music. 

“Britney Smears!” He says gleefully. “But what is this thing? A brick?” 

Harry actually laughs, feeling light for once, and says, “You can listen to music on it wherever you go! Here put these on.” 

Harry leans forward to slip the headphones over Draco’s perfect blond hair and then he presses the play button on the Walkman. Perhaps he’ll even show him how to make his own mixtapes. 

“Sick! All the Muggles use these devices?” Draco’s eyebrows are high in amazement and wonder. 

Harry had this secret underlying fear that Draco was still holding onto some of the pure blood bullshit, but it vanishes immediately at the awe in Draco’s eyes. No one who so vehemently hates Muggles would be fascinated by their magic-less workarounds. 

“How do they work without magic?” 

Harry explains it to him the best he can, but, frankly, batteries aren’t his area of expertise. Neither are radios or headphones or whatever. 

Narcissa gets a lovely pearl bracelet Harry had rushedly grabbed in Hogsmeade from a small antiquities store on his way there. She gives Harry a fancy looking maroon suit that she wants to immediately start fitting him in before dinner. Draco gets a similar one in an emerald shade that makes him look stunning. 

Narcissa tells both of them to change, so they do, and then she spends a while pacing around them, using magic to hem and let in the seams of their suits. It’s quite a long task, mostly because both boys' bodies have changed so much from the last time Narcissa saw them, but it’s worth it in the end because they both look fantastic. 

Harry finds himself hoping that Draco notices how well the suit fits him but he doesn’t even begin to wonder why. He wants everyone to see how good he looks—that’s all. 

“Now I’m going to get dressed. If you hear the door, make sure to answer it, alright? You know how Patches dislikes it,” Narcissa says after placing the final stitch on Harry’s wrist. 

These Malfoys are nothing like they used to be. They aren’t the same Malfoys Harry met all those years ago. 

Perhaps something good did come out of all that tragedy. 

“Got it, mum.” Draco smiles. 

“Thank you, Narcissa,” Harry says again, for like the 15th time. 

This suit is the softest, most luxurious piece of clothing Harry has ever owned. It fits him and his skinny body better than anything he has ever worn before. 

“No, thank you, Harry.” She presses her hand against his cheek softly, smiling in a way Harry hasn’t ever seen anyone smile at him besides Mrs. Weasley and his mum. 

It makes him somber, sobers him up a little. This look that she has, it’s a motherly look. Something Harry’s own mum probably looked at him with when he was a baby. 

Narcissa pats his cheek once and then rushes off to put on her gown, leaving Harry and Draco to sit around on the couch. 

Harry stays quiet for a while until he says, “You’re both so different.” 

“We are.” 

“I’m more surprised than I thought I’d be.” 

“That’s okay. We were...We had a lot of changing to do, you know? We were so stuck on the pure blood ideology like a...a bunch of fascists that it was all we could see. I saw it everywhere like...like pink triangles and stars of David stitched into people’s clothes. There were points where I saw through it, where I knew I had to get out, but I didn’t know how. I couldn’t very well ask for help and then there was my mum. The Malfoy name. My father.” 

“‘The only way out is through’,” Harry quotes, thinking of something Dumbledore had told him once, a long, long time ago.

“Until the end. Then you were there in our house, looking like you’d been mauled, and I...I knew it was you...and I couldn’t...couldn’t do that you. To anyone. But I couldn’t lie, either. He always knew when I was lying...and the punishment for that was  _ worse _ than death. There were times when I would have preferred he Avada K'd me, because it would have been simpler, easier, than giving him what he wanted.” 

“You did your best. You made it through and you saved our lives.” 

Well, some of them. He thinks of Dobby’s shallow grave in the sand and the carvings in Hermione’s skin that will never fade. 

“I could’ve done more...and, after, I knew it. I felt so fucking guilty and my father didn’t get that. He wanted to continue on like we were before and then he was sentenced to the Kiss and I...I...I felt relief. And even more guilty for being relieved.” 

Harry watches the ragged look on Draco’s gaunt face and he sighs, feeling small again. How dare he think anything good come from such a fucking tragedy. 

“But we had to change so we could move on. We’re not there yet, you know? It’s hard to unlearn all that shit and sometimes I catch myself doing or thinking things that are absolutely unacceptable, but they were so deeply ingrained in me from a young age that I do them almost without thinking.” 

Harry doesn’t know what to say so he just reaches out his hand in the space between them on the couch and Draco takes it. Squeezes. And then Harry nods softly, imperceptibly. 

“I understand.” And he thinks he actually does.

* * *

Later, Harry sits across from Draco at a table full of people he doesn’t know. Draco’s mother sits at the head of the table, looking like a badass in a floor length gold gown with the bracelet Harry bought her on her wrist. She drinks dark wine from a glass and smiles at the people around her, while Harry and Draco look at each other. 

“So, Narcissa,” says a short, bearded man with bright eyes, “how ever did you get the Saviour of the Wizarding World to join your dinner party?” 

Harry wilts a little in his chair, feeling dozens of eyes on him in his pretty red suit, and wanting nothing more than to run away. He also understands that this little man is questioning Narcissa’s status, so he watches her. Lets her react for him.

“He has a name, Archibald,” she says flatly, “and he’s here because he deserves a day to not be The Saviour or The Boy Who Lived or whatever name The Prophet has assigned to him this week. He’s just a boy and he deserves to have dinner without everyone staring at him like an exhibit in a museum. I’d hoped my friends would have the common decency not to fawn over him, but I was, unfortunately, wrong.” 

“I meant no harm, Narcissa—” 

“Then mean it.”

“Alright.” 

Harry smiles a little when everyone suddenly looks away from him and only the Malfoys gazes remain. Nods his head as thanks, despite still being uncomfortable. 

He doesn’t eat much at all, because he’s nauseated and thinking of his last Christmas on the run, but he manages a bit of their Christmas desserts, which are exquisite. No one talks about the War the entire night and it’s such a relief to be around strangers who may have some, but don’t ask, terrible, awful questions. 

After dinner, Draco and Harry sneak off with a bottle of champagne to the roof where Harry lets the icy air wake up his skin and mess up his hair. Draco tries to cast a Rechauff, but Harry doesn’t want it. 

The air cuts through his suit and makes him feel something. Makes him feel alive again. He lights a cigarette and smokes it, shares the champagne with Malfoy, and survives the night. He survives another day, though he can’t help thinking about his last Christmas with his best friends on the run for their fucking lives when he almost hadn’t. He thinks of the locket pulling tight around his neck and the doe glowing bright in the dark woods. He thinks of his wand and Voldemort’s necromantic snake curled up inside that poor, dead woman. 

Harry tries to run from the memories by looking for the bottom of the bottle but it doesn’t work. Only makes it worse. 

They both get a little tipsy off of disgustingly expensive champagne and Malfoy drags him inside when his lips start to go blue. He doesn’t feel like he’s freezing to death, but that’s probably the alcohol. Or maybe it’s whatever seems to be sapping the joy out of his life. Either or. 

Harry pushes into Malfoy’s room, moving quietly because there are still guests here who probably wish he’d died and stayed dead, and then he looks at the space. 

An entire wall is made up of books on shelves from floor to ceiling. There’s a balcony door that must lead outside and a desk covered in sketches and ink splattered feathers. The closet is expansive and, probably, expensive as well and there’s a fireplace opposite Draco’s mussed up bed. 

None of that really surprises him, though. Draco and Harry have been sharing a room for two months, so he sort of has a good grasp on who Malfoy is and how he spends his time. 

“Nice place,” Harry says bluntly, thinking of the dreary rooms of Grimmauld Place and the nasty portraits on the walls. 

The Malfoy manor is conspicuously empty of any paintings. 

“I think so.” 

“Wanna smoke?” Harry’s not even close to drunk and he can feel the anxiety starting up in his chest from the memories. 

He just wants to fucking run away. 

And so they do.

Harry and Draco warm up by the fireplace, even though Harry doesn’t mind being cold, and they take turns blowing smoke into the fire so it wafts up instead of around. Or that’s their theory at least. 

Harry’s going to smoke until his chest stops hurting and his brain stops freaking the fuck out. He’s going to get so high he can’t think of any of the bad things and then he’s going to sleep. 

“That suit looks good on you,” Draco says quietly, like he’s trying to play it cool. 

Harry likes Draco’s suit too. More specifically, he likes the way his shoulders look in the perfectly fitted garment and he likes the brightness of his hair against the dark green. Draco looks amazing in it.

“All thanks to your mum.”

“Well, only the suit part, but yeah.” 

Harry’s too high to make sense of that, but was it a compliment? Who knows. 

“What happened with you and the Weaslette?” 

Harry rolls his eyes at Draco’s nickname for Ginny, one everyone sort of took on when Draco and Harry started hanging around each other more, and sighs. Lets the smoke rise into the air as he lowers the bowl from his mouth. 

“I’m obviously a fucking wreck and she...she wanted more from me than I have to give. Plus I think I’m probably gay, so.” 

For Muggles and some Pureblood wizards, gayness is sort of this taboo thing, so he’s still struggling with that, plus the aftereffects of the war. He’s so fucking lost that he has no clue. Maybe he’s neither. He has no answers for himself or others. 

“How do you know?” 

“That I might be gay? I don’t. I just don’t think I’m into girls, so.” 

“I think I feel similarly,” he whispers, smoke falling from his lips into the air. “But I can’t be sure.” 

“Greengrass didn’t do it for you?” Harry’s lip lifts at the edge, joking. 

“We didn’t...We weren’t.” 

“Ah.” 

“Yeah.” 

Harry decides fuck it. He may not be able to figure out how he’s ever going to be okay in a world where so many died, but he can damn well figure out if he’s gay or not. Easy enough, right? Especially with an attractive and similarly confused boy right here. 

“Want to find out?” Harry passes the bowl and lighter to Draco. “As friends?” 

“Wouldn’t that be weird?” 

“Only if we made it weird. We’re just figuring ourselves out, you know?” 

Draco nods, looks away for a second, and then nods again. 

“Alright. Kiss me, then, Potter.” A challenge. Fine. 

Harry sets down the bowl on the edge of the fireplace stones and leans up on his knees to hold Draco’s face in gentle hands. His eyes are wide and dark, his mouth shines in the firelight. Harry lets his right hand slide down to loosen Draco’s tie a little, half-smiling. He isn't sure how long he's wanted this, but the feeling wells up inside of him like a volcano on the cusp of eruption. 

Draco looks beautiful like this. Stricken, anticipating, shocking. He looks like a cosmic event, like a supernova, alive with light and colour. Harry wants so suddenly that it surprises him, but maybe it was there all along, buried under all the pain. 

He leans in and does what his body and his mind want him to do—he kisses Draco. 

He smells like weed and champagne and second hand cigarette smoke, but he feels like solace. Like home. 

His face is a little scratchy, like he’s forgotten to shave, and his mouth is firm. His lips are soft, though, and full and so different from Ginny’s that Harry is immediately taken away from this place, away from his past. He is just a nameless boy, sharing kisses with another. That is all. 

All thoughts of keeping this simple fly out of his mind because there’s a new distraction.

Draco sighs a little, lifts his hands to hold Harry’s arms, and opens his mouth under the pressure of Harry’s tongue on his lips. Harry lifts his hand and runs his fingers through Draco’s sculpted hair, which is surprisingly soft against his skin. 

This whole thing is nothing like kissing Ginny was. It is so much better and so much worse at the same time. Harry never wants it to stop, never wants to stop feeling this way. Lost, but in the best fucking way. 

Draco pulls away first, but only because Patches Apparates right next to them. Thankfully, he’s turned the other way, so they have time to separate before he turns and looks at them. 

“Narcissa requests your presence,” he says brightly. “Christmas crackers!” 

Harry and Draco, still flushed from kissing, stand up. Harry notices Draco’s half-hard in his pants as Patches Disapparates away, so he turns so Draco can adjust himself. 

“Crackers?” Harry asks, smiling a little at the redness of Draco’s cheeks. 

“Nightly tradition.” 

Harry nods and Draco leads the way out of the room, stopping only to turn off the lights and cast charms to hopefully hide the weed smell. Harry turns to shut the door behind them and when he’s looking down, Draco comes up behind him. 

“Did you figure it out?” He asks, voice low. 

“Did  _ you?” _

Draco smirks a little, looking sophisticated and regal and dangerous, “Yes.” 

“So did I.” 

And then Harry does something a little brave. Brought on by the booze and the pot and the blood singing in his veins, he lifts his head and kisses Draco again, holding onto his tie firmly. This time, he has a better feel for how Draco’s mouth will move, so he does it harsher, quicker. Then he pulls away, leaving Draco open mouthed and wanting for more in the doorway. 

* * *

Turns out, Harry does know more people at this party than just the Malfoys. Andromeda and Teddy, his godson, show up just in time for the crackers. 

“Teddy,” Harry says softly, broken-heartedly. 

He hasn’t seen him in months, has been too distracted with being fucked up to be around anyone so impressionable, but he’s already so big. His hair is still just as black as it was in May, but his face is different, like he’s growing into it. At almost 8 months old, Harry feels awfully for not being well enough to be around him. 

“Harry,” Andromeda says in a delicate voice. “How are you?” 

“I’m okay.” He’s so not. “You?” 

“Merry Christmas,” is all she says, something heavy in her eyes. 

Teddy, who she holds in her arms, reaches out for Harry, like he remembers him. He can’t possibly, but the thought brings tears to Harry’s eyes. 

“Would you mind?” she asks, leaning in to pass him over. “I’m going to speak with Narcissa.” 

Teddy looks up at Harry with wide, innocent eyes. Remus’ eyes. 

Harry didn’t know his own dad, didn’t have the chance to, and he hoped he’d ended that cycle with himself, but here Teddy is. Fatherless. Motherless. Alone in this world, like Harry was. 

Hopefully Andromeda treats him better than the Dursleys treated Harry. 

“You know,” he says softly, whispering in full sentences like he’s speaking with another adult as he slowly bounces Teddy on his hip, “we did this for you so you can live the best possible life without fear. I only wish it came at less of a price for you. You had no part in this war, and yet you lost both parents, lost a well-deserved home. At least I fought. I tortured. I got people killed. I’m not an innocent life hurt in a war I had no part in, like you are...so I’m sorry that I took part in something that got your parents murdered. That i played a role in the thing that destroyed everything you could have had.” 

Teddy just looks up at him with wide eyes and giggles a little. Presses a fat, baby hand against Harry’s throat as Remus’ eyes stare into Harry’s, filled with joy. 

Harry blinks away the tears in his eyes and bounces him gently on his hip as he sniffles. 

“I’m gonna make sure you have a better life than I did, alright, Teddy? Nothing but the highest quality existence for you.” 

Draco and his mother approach with Christmas crackers in hand. Harry’s not sure if the noise will scare the baby, so he passes Teddy off to Narcissa who grins broadly at him and walks him off somewhere else, babbling in a high pitched voice about how cute he is. 

“Got a wish?” Draco asks as they both grasp an end to pull. 

“Just wanna be okay again.” 

“Me, too.” 

They pull and with a  **_bang!,_ ** the cracker separates and Draco gets a paper crown to wear in a beautiful shiny gold. He looks ethereal and regal with the tissue on his head and Harry wants to kiss him again, suddenly. Wants to keep kissing him for a long time. 

* * *

Harry spends the rest of the break in the Malfoys’ home, alternating between fits of anxiety about overstaying his welcome and dreading the return to Hogwarts and its bad memories. He also spends quite a lot of time thinking of Draco’s mouth on his neck, but that’s a different thing entirely. 

He tells himself it's just because he's horny or something. He's just lonely and Draco was there for him, so he's got an emotional attachment. Besides, Draco makes no move to touch Harry outside of accidentals and holding hands during nightmares. 

Harry Apparates once more during the trip to get more weed and he brings Draco with him, just to scare the shit out of Dudley and his stupid Muggle friend when they both disappear into thin air.

Draco buys an eighth, too, and pays with a couple golden Galleons that shine and sparkle. He and Harry Disapparate before Dudley and his friend even realize what kind of coins they’re holding. 

Bad for business, maybe, but too fucking funny to watch. 

They get high and they laugh and Harry manages to eat without feeling guilty about it for once in a very long time. It’s not much, just a ham sandwich Narcissa makes him from leftovers, but it makes him feel a bit better. 

On his last night there, he and Draco drag Narcissa and Patches up to the balcony and they all get stoned as a final goodbye. Patches, as someone who doesn’t usually have access to drugs of any type, rebuffs their offer and Disapparates on the spot to go to sleep or whatever Elves do at half one in the morning. 

Harry’s smiling at Narcissa, completely shocked, because she takes a hit from the joint he’d rolled like she’s done it a million times. 

“Wizards have this, too,” she says, blowing smoke out into the cold air. “It’s just called something different.” 

“We do?” Draco looks puzzled. 

“Ever heard of Alihotsy? Well, if you hex the leaves in just the right way...you can smoke it. Brings about a good laugh, but it’s a lot more work than going out into Muggle London and hunting down some good grass.” 

“Grass?!” Draco sputters.  _ “Mother!”  _

“What?” She grins. “I was young once, too!” 

“I’ve never heard of Alihotsy,” Harry says thoughtfully, interrupting Draco’s shock. 

“Oh, God. It’s so funny; I haven’t thought about Hotsy in so long! Maybe we can talk Patches into picking some up for us.” 

_ “Mum!”  _

Harry can’t help but laugh at the look on Draco’s face. Beautiful, but embarrassed and frazzled and shocked all at once. At Harry’s laugh, his face changes into one of annoyance, which only makes Harry laugh harder. 

“I really shouldn’t be encouraging this, but we’re all adults here, right?” Narcissa asks and then she calls out for Patches in a kind voice; he shows up, wearing a light blue nightcap like Ebeneezer Scrooge and a nightgown that barely brushes the floor. 

It’s tailored exquisitely and Harry briefly wonders if Narcissa’s hand created the small, intricate stitching. 

“Can you do us a big favour?” 

“Of course, Narcissa! Of course!” 

“Can you go to Hogwarts and ask Professor Slughorn for some Hotsy? Tell him it’s for me.” 

“I will be back in an instantaneous!” And then he’s gone. 

“I can’t believe I’m getting stoned with my mother.” Draco looks like he’s had a stroke. “My mother and Harry fucking Potter.”

Patches is back in, as he said, an instantaneous. He Apparates back right where he disappeared from, holding a small jar and a note. 

“I’d nearly forgotten.” Narcissa says and cringes. “It’s half two in the morning!” 

“He was awake, Narcissa! Awake and reading!” Patches hands her the two objects. “Patches go to bed now. Bon night, friendlies!” And then he’s gone. 

Harry has a moment where he has to pause what he’s doing to catch his breath because he's in pain. Patches is nothing like Dobby, isn’t really free, doesn’t have a penchant for obscure clothing items, isn’t freakishly loud, but he just. Acts. Like Dobby sometimes. And it hurts something deep in Harry's chest like a sharp blade. 

“Already hexed. Sick.” 

“Why haven’t I heard of this?” Draco’s brow is furrowed and Harry wants to kiss him. 

Wants to smooth out the wrinkles between his brows with his fingertips. 

“It was just an elite thing,” she says, sounding a little embarrassed. “Not elite, but, you know. Pureblood. So when Dumbledore came around, he hated elitism and swore to never allow the knowledge of it to exist. That’s why you don’t even hear about the tree itself in class.” 

“Oh,” Draco says, looking a little underwhelmed by the answer. 

Harry’s shoulders slump a little. Elite. That’s what the Death Eaters thought they were. They thought they were so fucking superior to the poor little dirty blooded freaks around them and it divided the whole wizarding world so widely it left a chasm that won’t be healed until way after Harry’s death. Way after even Teddy’s, probably. 

Dumbledore and the elitism that killed him. Fitting. 

* * *

They smoke Alihotsy into the early morning hours. It causes bubbling laughter and inexplicable joy and also tastes like grape cough syrup. It relieves Harry of some of the weight on his chest for a while, which feels so impossibly great that he never wants to come down. 

Narcissa heads to bed a little after 4, stating that she’s too old to be up past 5. So then Draco and Harry sit on the balcony, warmed by a  _ Rechauff, _ and smoke the last of it.

Narcissa said it’s nearly impossible to over do it, so neither of them worry about it. Just sit across from each other, the toes of their toes touching, and breathe in the cold air. 

Talking feels impossible for Harry. Even the idea of pushing air through his mouth with words in it sounds like something he’s completely forgotten how to do. Draco doesn’t seem to be having that problem, though. 

“I miss our rivalry,” he says, sounding forlorn. “I miss the fire of it, you know? Like I used to loathe you so deeply that it filled me with spite. Everything I did was out of spite and with the intention of setting you off. I wanted so badly for you to just fuckin freak out that I did anything. I did everything. 

“There are a lot of things I’m ashamed of, you know? I’m ashamed of what happened with Hagrid and what I did and said to Hermione and all the names I’ve called half-bloods and Muggle-borns. I don’t know how to move on from it. I’m so fucked up over everything that I’ve spent my life doing that I don’t know how I’ll ever heal. How I’ll ever grow. It just sort of feels like everything—the bad memories, my atrocities, the weight of the upcoming future—is going to come to a head and I’m going to Avada K myself.” 

Harry’s tongue feels disconnected from his mouth, but if it wasn’t, he might say “Can you do that?” He might say, “I regret everything I ever did to you, too.” He might say “I’m sorry. I knew you were in deep shit and I didn’t care to do anything at all,” or maybe just “Me, too.” 

Instead he just looks at Draco’s profile in the darkness, at the shine of his eyes, and listens, because he is a man with no tongue. 

“Moody should have just left me as a goddamn ferret.” 

“It wasn’t Moody, you know.” Harry’s mouth moves, but he doesn’t ask it to. Couldn’t even say another word if he tried. 

“I know...it’s just easier than saying ‘Barty Crouch Jr. polyjuiced as Mad-eye Moody turned me into a weasel and he should have left me as one.’” 

Harry goes silent again as Draco keeps blathering on for a long while. Then, as if suddenly remembering he is a person and has a body, Harry leans in, so close to Draco’s face he can feel his hot breath against his mouth as he talks. He lifts his hands, which feel weirdly detached from his arms, and rests them on Draco’s neck, thumbs just under his jaw. Draco stops talking to look at Harry with shining eyes in the darkness of the hidden moon. 

“Why are you looking at me like that?” 

Harry’s tongue still feels disconnected so he just rests his forehead against Malfoy’s and breathes. He shuts his eyes and lets the icy air fill his lungs. Draco, as if struck by whatever is affecting Harry’s voice, suddenly quiets down and does the same. 

“We should go to bed,” Malfoy says after a while, not moving like his words suggest. “Busy day tomorrow.” 

Tomorrow, Harry and Draco return to Hogwarts. They return to the memories of dead bodies in empty corridors and old friends who have forgotten them. They return to their classes, as few as there are left, and then they return to the forest after that. 

The shock of the thought reconnects his tongue to his mouth, thankfully, so he can speak. 

“Of course; Let’s go.”

They stand up, making sure they haven’t left anything to burn in the early hour, and shake off their Rechauffs at the balcony door. They climb through and promptly crash onto Draco’s unmade bed. 

Thankfully, Harry and Draco have gotten better at maneuvering around one another, sober or not, so they manage not to violently injure one another in their search for the duvet. 

The clock is just striking 6:00 when Harry grabs a hold of Draco’s boney hand and dozes off to sleep. Draco stays silent, but Harry can feel his gaze even as he loses his clarity to dreams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know what you think??? Sometimes it feels a bit like I'm writing to myself lmfaoo


	4. relapse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I keep extending the book, because my life is chaos and I can't stop writing lmao. Here's this, the second to last chapter, I promise!

A day back from the Winter holiday and The Prophet publishes an article about the supposed reemergence of the death eaters and cites the new Malfoy mansion as their newest local hangout. Ridiculous. 

Harry brushes it off as nonsense, isn’t worried about it at all, because he’s just spent two bloody weeks at new Malfoy Manor and seen nothing worrying at all. He outwardly expresses this to anyone who will listen, because the Malfoys are changing, becoming better, and he doesn't like that their progress is being disregarded entirely based on tactless articles and nonsense writings. 

Draco has a harder time with it than Harry thought he would. Mostly because he had assumed incorrectly that Hogwarts was a safe space now when it so obviously isn't. 

With the new unity wards, Harry was under the impression that no bullying could occur between students, but apparently that isn’t true, or it doesn’t apply to former Death Eaters. Harry’s been so out of it he hadn’t noticed the way Draco waited until class had started to walk the halls, left extra late for meals. He was avoiding the crowds and their taunting. 

He’s witness to it firsthand two days after another article is released. He’s walking with Draco, standing close enough that their arms touch as they move, not saying a word. They do this a lot now, this quiet company-thing, so no one looks surprised, but it still feels new. Maybe the newness comes from the new, light feeling in Harry’s chest as he bumps against Malfoy’s shoulder or the way his breath catches at every soft smile Draco’s willing to give him. 

Anyway, Harry and Draco are headed to their Unusual Potions class when someone, apparently not seeing Harry at all, shoves Draco hard enough that his momentum causes them both to skitter into the wall. Pain blooms bright on Harry’s shoulder as he slams it into the concrete and he groans. Looks down to see Draco on the floor with blood on his face and tears in his beautiful grey eyes.

A sixth year boy is sneering down at him, dressed in Gryffindor red and gold, saying, “Traitorous scum. Should’ve died in the war like all your Death Eater friends.” 

Harry scowls at him, pushes off the wall with all the ferocity he can muster. All of his usual fatigue is gone, because no one is mean to Malfoy _except_ Harry. Not anymore, not under his watch. 

“What the _fuck_ are you doing?” Harry asks pointedly, hand already reaching for his wand to defend Draco at any cost. “Bullying isn't allowed here. Violence has no place in Hogwarts anymore.” 

“What?” The boy scowls back, confused. “You should be thanking me! I took down a Death Eater—the enemy!” 

“He’s not our enemy anymore; he’s one of us, not a Death Eater at all.” 

“Yes, he _is!_ Look at his arm; you know what’s there.” 

Harry does know, has seen it firsthand, but he doesn’t care. Draco is still just a boy, just barely 19. He had been even younger when he was forced to make a decision that would impact his life forever, so in Harry’s opinion, he's not at fault for making an impossible choice. How could he ever pick running away over his parents, over the only life he ever knew? 

“I gave my life to that war,” Harry says strongly, “and I asked for nothing in return. I did it all without pausing, without a second thought, and I’d do it again, but Draco wasn’t given that choice, not until now, and he’s decided that he’s with us. Anything you do to him, you do to me. He’s under my protection now.” 

Harry may be crumbling under the stress of living, but he still has pull at this school. No one fucks with him and now that protection extends to Draco, as it should’ve long ago. 

“If anyone so much as looks at him, you’ll deal with me. I don’t care what you think he is, because I know he isn’t. Got it?” 

The kid’s face pales. Harry notices they’ve gathered quite the crowd, but he’s glad for it today. At least the news will get out that Draco’s off limits. That he’s finally chosen correctly. 

“Got it.” The kid practically sprints away. 

Draco’s hand touches Harry’s so so so gently and Harry lifts him to his feet. He’s still bleeding from a cut on his forehead and his nose, but Harry takes care of that with the most powerful _Episkey_ he can muster. He’s still running on rage, though it’s starting to wane, and his _Episkey_ is perfect. 

“You good?” He asks as the adrenaline starts to wear off. 

He hadn’t realized it in the moment, but the argument took a lot out of him. Poor Draco had been dealing with this for months, all alone as he was abused every single day, because Harry rarely went to class or meals with him. That ends now. 

“I’m good.” Draco touches Harry’s arm where he’d slammed into the wall. "Are you?" 

It almost draws a groan from Harry’s chest, because it’s such a deep ache. Possibly, it’s already started to bruise, free blood trapped beneath his skin. 

“I'm fine.” Harry can survive this pain, because physical pain is the easiest to bear, but the other? He’s not sure that won’t be the death of him yet. 

Harry rolls his shoulder a little and puts on his brave face as Draco stares at him, a strange contemplative look on his face. 

* * *

**HARRY POTTER SPOTTED WITH DEATH EATER SCUM**

_by Rita Skeeter_

Harry could literally throw up. Like projectile vomit all over The stupid Prophet. 

He’s sitting in the dining hall with Draco, Luna, and Pansy at the end of the eighth year table. There’s a plate of uneaten food in front of him that he’s trying to find the stomach to eat, but he just. Can’t. Also there’s a newspaper in Susan Bones’ hands in the seat diagonal to him that’s he’s trying to avoid reading, but he can’t escape the large bold headline. 

Underneath the headline is a moving picture of Draco and Harry walking the halls together quietly, both looking somber and exhausted. If that is truly what Harry looks like—a skeleton with skin and hair, more dead than alive—then maybe he should eat. Maybe he should get it together. Because no living person looks like that. 

But maybe Harry’s been dead all along and no one has had the heart to tell him that he’s a ghost now, wandering Hogwarts as his final resting place for eternity. Maybe he is the new Nearly-Headless Nick, cursed to roam the lands forever, not quite entirely dead at all. How does he ask the people around him if it's true? Would they lie to protect him? 

Draco is at Harry’s side, also staring at Susan Bones’ dumb newspaper with a look of resigned horror on his face. Harry wants to say something, wants to make Rita Skeeter shut the fuck up about stuff she doesn’t know about, but what could he really do? Try and lock her in a jar like Hermione had? Tell Draco it’s all a lie? 

“Can I see that when you’re done, Susan?” Asks Ron with patience, who sits two seats up with Hermione at his side. 

Harry has avoided looking at him since returning to meals two days ago, but he does now. Ron’s grown up a lot over the past few months, looks tougher and older, scarred by time and history. He doesn’t look like the boy Harry once knew at all. 

Surprisingly, Harry’s relieved. Ron is growing up, changing, evolving right in front of everyone’s eyes. The changes look good on him, like he’s recovering in all the ways Harry isn’t. 

Susan hands him the paper wordlessly, obviously finished with it. Harry watches Skeleton Harry and Draco walk across the paper as Ron pulls out his wand and Incendio-s it right in the air in front of him. The ashes scatter on the waffles in front of him, but he just. Sighs. Like he’s satisfied. And continues his conversation with Hermione. 

Harry turns back to his plate and smiles a little, just for himself and for Draco. Maybe even a little bit for Ron, too.

* * *

That night when Harry’s pressed up against Draco’s side in his bed, he turns to look at him. His eyes are open and he’s staring up at the stars on the ceiling, tears trailing down the sides of his cheeks silently. His chest is rising and falling rapidly, but he makes no sound, gives no sign of his distress. 

“Draco,” Harry whispers, feeling something ragged and broken in his chest. “What’s wrong?” 

He shuts his eyes slowly, sniffles. Draws a pillow close to him in his arms like he’s in pain, like he’s waiting for it to stop but it won’t. 

“I’m completely fucking your life up,” is what he says, breath shaking so badly that Harry can barely understand him. “They’re right. I’m shit. I’m destroying your reputation and...and you keep putting your bloody neck out for me when all it’ll get you is grief!” 

“I don’t care about my reputation, alright? It’ll never matter to me...not like you do.” 

It’s true. Harry’s fame and legacy means shit-all to him. He’s never cared much for what others thought of him or what they said about him, unless it was Draco doing the talking and thinking and it’s been that way since they were 11. 

“I only care about you being alright,” he says softly. “That you’re safe. That no one’s hurting you.” 

“But _you’re_ hurting me,” Draco whispers . “The way you look at me...the way I feel around you...people are noticing, Harry. They’re going to figure it out.” 

“I’m hurting you?” Harry asks softly, confused. “How do you feel when you’re around me?”

“You’re an idiot, Potter,” is all Draco says, looking up at Harry, who is half on top of him in concern, and blinks. Then he surges up, wraps one hand around Harry’s neck, and pulls him down into a hot kiss. 

Harry’s surprised, but happy about it. He hasn’t kissed Draco since the holidays and he’d missed the warmth it brought to his chest, mised the fire singing in his veins, the burn of Draco’s skin against his. Harry kisses him back, one hand pressed to the pillow to the right of his body to hold himself up, one knee balancing him by Draco’s thigh. 

He knows he should pull away so they can continue talking, but he wants to feel lost in whatever this feeling is that’s building in his chest. Wants so badly to melt away from his anxiety and the stress of it all. So he does. He gives in to something he’s been fighting for almost a decade and it’s better than he could’ve ever imagined. 

Draco’s mouth is warm and soft, nothing like it had been before, but it’s new and fantastic and inviting. Draco tugs at the hair on Harry’s neck, uncut and unusually long from neglect, and it feels so impossibly good that Harry can’t help himself. 

He groans and, without thinking, lifts his other leg over Draco’s thighs to straddle him. He’s never done this before, not with Ginny or anyone else, but it feels right and Draco doesn’t stop, continues kissing him as his hands hold Harry around his hips. 

Harry uses the new angle to touch Draco’s cheek, lets his hand trail down his pale neck to his shoulder and arm. Then he reaches back up and touches his delicate white hair, curls a long lock around his fingers and pulls a little. So soft. How is his hair so soft? 

“Draco,” Harry whispers, almost asking him. 

“Shh.” Draco kisses him again, opens his mouth and Harry can taste toothpaste on his tongue.

* * *

By breakfast the next morning, there’s another publication. 

It seems like Rita’s really pushing the new sequential articles for the first time since the war. For a while, she wrote about the trials and then about Harry and his supposed hoard of fans. Then about Harry’s search for a “wife” after they heard of his breakup with Ginny. Then more death eater stuff. The return of Voldemort and supposed sightings. Then Harry stopped reading, because he skipped so many meals. Now that he’s returned, he can see that he and Draco must be the muses for her next series. 

**_SAVIOUR TAINTED BY DEATH EATER SCUM: How Our Golden Boy Was Compromised by V*ldemort’s Right-Hand Lackey_ **

_By Rita Skeeter_

Maybe “muse” isn’t the right word. 

Susan doesn’t seem to even realize that the headline is right in Draco’s face, but Hermione does the honours this time. She takes it gently from Susan’s hands and burns it to ash in the air behind their table so the ash doesn’t ruin anyone’s meal. She meets Harry’s eyes and he knows he has to stop avoiding them. Has to stop running away. But how? 

Draco lowers his eyes and stares at his plate for the rest of the meal, not even looking up when Harry places a hand on his knee. It’s then that Harry starts to worry. 

Something really bad could happen to Draco. 

It’s the first moment that Harry realizes he cares deeply about Draco’s well-being. The realization was inevitable, of course, but still hard to swallow. Another person in Harry’s life that he’s destined to fail at protecting. The thought makes him shake with anxiety. 

“Let’s skip magizoology,” Harry whispers into Draco’s ear. “I can’t hear one more thing about a fucking pogrebin.” 

Draco nods and Harry manages to drink the rest of his hot coffee in one sip before he stands up and leads Draco down the halls and up the stairs to the old Astronomy Tower. The damage is severe and it shifts wildly in the wind, but Harry and Draco move without fear. 

They’ve spent many wordless nights up here, sitting on the rickety edge, wondering what bad thing would happen to them next. Wondering if the building would finally crumble and bring their sufferings to an end. 

Harry casts a _Rechauff_ over himself and then Draco, who barely notices, and they sit upon the edge. Harry takes a while to gather the courage to speak as he light a cigarette, struggling to figure out what he really wants to say. 

“Do you remember that day I asked to be your friend?” Draco says, in the meantime. “When you said no?” 

Harry nods, confused, wondering where he’s going with this. 

“I deserved that. It was just the first time anyone ever really said no to me, you know? Of course, after that, I wasn’t babied as much by my parents. They, or, well, my father, I mean...He really started to lay into me when I started Hogwarts. Wanted me to be perfect. Act perfect. _Exude_ pompous pureblood energy. Use the M word. It sorta fucked me up, you know, in every imaginable way.

"But, uh, anyway I took your rejection so personally that it infiltrated my thoughts. My actions. My words. Even my dreams were full of you, though at that point I wanted to turn you into a chipmunk.” 

Harry had been similarly consumed, but only really dreamt of Malfoy during sixth year when he watched him on the map religiously. He knew Draco had been watching him, but not to the same extent Harry had been watching him. Both had been trying to foil the other’s plans, had been wondering what the other was doing, were obsessed with getting to know exactly what the other was planning. 

It’s no wonder they’re still attached, still linked, with all the weird shit they did just to spy on one another. They were invested. 

“You were in mine, too. Doing bastardly things, usually. Up to no good.” Harry tries to laugh, because it is funny, sort of, but it falls flat. 

“I _was_ up to no good. Everything I did here is tainted with the memory of him.” 

“Voldemort?” Harry asks, because he hates it when people don’t say it. 

It adds to his infamy and Harry wants him to have none. Wants him to be forgotten and only remembered as the angry little boy who wanted too much. To be just Tom, an orphan, an angry little boy so terrified of death and his parentage that he did everything to spite them, dying earlier than if he had just lived a normal wizard life. 

“Yeah. Voldemort.” Draco sounds like he gets what Harry wants without him having to say it. “I think...I think I’m gonna leave.”

“What?” Harry’s head whips around to look at him. 

A destroyed 19-year old boy, worn down by the demons of his past, only skin and bones. Harry must look the same, because he is the same. At least inside. 

“I’m causing too much trouble for you, Potter,” he says, the old nickname sounding fond and sad. So sad. “But unlike before, I know...I know it has to st-op this time.” 

His voice, hollow and fragile, cracks. 

“Draco, _no._ You’re my only _friend—”_

“Not true.”

“It _is_ true. You’re the only one who really understands me right now.”

“‘Right now’,” he whispers, shutting his eyes gently, jaw quivering like he's in a tremendous amount of pain. “Right now, we are both grieving and in pain. Right now, maybe we are similar. But what happens when you’re better? When you aren’t like _me_ anymore? Because I...I won’t get better. I think this is it for me, this is my cross to bear, my hill to die on, so when you are better, I’ll be alone. You’ll leave _me_ alone. Sometimes...Sometimes it’s easier to leave than to _be_ left. Hurts less.” 

“What are you _talking_ about?” Harry can’t even make sense of what’s happening. 

His brain is overloaded and he’s crumbling under the pressure to make it function again. His voice is loud, though. A little angry, mostly upset. 

“This is my cross, _too!_ I killed Voldemort. I _killed_ the dark lord. This war that I played a fundamental part in killed _hundreds_ of innocent people! My friends, my family. I won’t get better, Draco, because this is my life. I’ve used all 3 Unforgivable curses, I cursed you almost to death, my uncle died because I couldn’t control the fucking link I had with Tom fucking Riddle! I have done so much shit that it’s eating me alive and you’re worried about me suddenly overcoming it and writing you off?” 

Draco says nothing, just blinks and blinks and blinks until Harry realizes he’s crying. Harry automatically touches his own face, feeling cold despite the _Rechauff_ and finds he’s crying, too. 

“What a sad lot we are,” Harry says, sighing, wiping at his face. “But we _are_ a lot, the both of us, together, so don’t get any ideas, alright? We’re sticking this out together.” 

Harry notices that Draco doesn’t agree or disagree, just stays silent and leans into Harry’s side, but it’s good enough, for now. Harry wraps him up in his arms as the sun shines warm against their backs. The day is so young, but Harry feels incredibly old, like an elderly man aged by time and by pain, closer to his death than his birth.

* * *

By the time dinner rolls around, Harry’s had enough of people jeering at him. It starts out quietly, has probably been brewing since the onslaught of the articles, and comes to head, so to speak. He notices it first when he returns to the halls after leaving Draco. The stares are more intense than usual, more focused. There’s mistrust in their eyes, hate and fear. It’s so out of place that, as the looks grow more intense throughout the day, he gets more and more uncomfortable. More uneasy on his feet. 

After dinner, when he’s doing his typical wandering, he’s suddenly surrounded by a crowd. They’re all students, all younger than he is, but they look giant. Intimidating. His breath catches in his throat when he realizes there’s no escape; he’s trapped by these nameless 6th years. 

Harry’s name whispers around him through the crowd. Then he hears Malfoy’s. Hears _Death Eater_ and _tainted_ and _ruined._ Hears words like _disgusting_ and _converted_ and _blood purist. Dark Lord_ and _worship_ and _sympathizer._

He gets lost in the words for a moment, spinning in one spot to try and regain his footing, but he can’t. Not with those awful words being said around him at an impossible volume. Louder and louder and louder until he can’t breathe, can’t think, can’t do anything but fall to his knees and clap his hands over his ears to try and block out the sounds as the children surround him. He wants to scream to drown out the noise of hateful words, but how could any sound he makes be as loud as these? As the accusations? 

He starts to rock back on his heels, trying anything to push down the noise, but he can’t.

He can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t he can’t

* * *

He’s not sure how long it takes, how long he sits there, rocking and crying to himself, but the noise quiets. He feels arms on his shoulders, holding him in place. Hears something other than the screaming of hateful words. 

“It’s okay. Harry, I’ve got you.” 

He doesn’t remove his hands from his ears, but he tries to focus on something to calm down. He has to focus on anything except the life he’s been given. 

Whose voice is that? Whose arms are around him? 

“No one can hurt you now, okay? I’ve got you.” 

Who the fuck is that? Why does Harry feel so calm in the arms of a stranger? 

“I won’t let anyone near you. I was giving you space, you know, because that’s what I thought you needed. That’s what the books say to do, anyway. Space and time. But I missed you...and...and you need help and that’s what friends are for.” 

Harry clutches her arms and shakes like a leaf. He feels raw, like the crowd tore off his skin and stripped him bare for all to see. Saw all the bad things he did to make it this far, all the people he hurt, all the people he killed. Left him bleeding and aching like an open wound. 

Everyone knows now that he’s a fraud. 

It’s almost a relief. 

“Hermione?” He whispers and she squeezes him tighter at how weak he probably sounds. 

“Who else might I be?” 

“Thank you.”

* * *

Hermione tucks him into bed and leaves, making him promise to talk to her after he rests. He doesn’t sleep, though, because he’s afraid of the new nightmares that will haunt his dreams. Instead, he watches the stars sparkle and waits for Draco. 

It’s nearly midnight when he finally shows up, already freshly showered, still in his robes. 

“Where were you?” Harry asks quietly. 

“Prefect bath. Frightened a third year into giving me the password. It’s _Cruppies,_ in case you were curious.” 

Harry might’ve been, in another time, on a different day. Yesterday, perhaps, he’d have been excited, but not today. Not after this dark, haunted day. 

“Thanks.” 

Draco strips down to his underwear and puts on silk pajamas before he gracefully slides into Harry’s bed. 

It’s become such a routine that neither of them even notice that they used to sleep alone. 

It’s only when he settles down beside Harry that Harry realizes how exhausted he is. His eyelids droop helplessly as Malfoy turns to him, holds one thin brittle hand in his. 

“Granger had to rescue you?” He whispers, sounding as exhausted as Harry feels. “From a mob?” 

“Something like that. I just...I got overwhelmed.” 

“They were calling you names.” 

“I don’t care about that stuff. It doesn't matter.” 

“They were saying you were lying with the enemy.” 

“I never slept with Voldemort,” Harry says shortly, so tired he misses Draco’s meaning the first time around. “Oh...no, you’re not my enemy. You never really were.” 

“Good night, Harry,” Draco says softly, that strange thoughtful look still on his face. 

“G’night, Draco.” 

Harry presses his cheek into the pillow, hand still clutched in Draco’s, and shuts his eyes. The relief of the action is immeasurable. A few moments later, when he’s almost asleep, he feels Draco’s lips on his forehead. 

Then, a whisper so soft it makes almost no noise at all. 

“I love you, Harry.” 

And finally, nothing at all.

* * *

Harry wakes up screaming. 

He’s alone in his bed, fingers clutching the sheets in panic, body covered in sweat, throat raw from shouting. 

Harry can still feel claws on his skin and teeth in his flesh, turned into a chew toy for a man who is more wolf than human, more animal than person. He can still taste his own blood on his tongue as he gagged on it, as the creature tore him apart, tendon by tendon. 

He sits up, shocked by how real his nightmares still are. It’s been almost a year since the war and he’s still fucking haunted. Still stuck on deaths he’ll never get over. Still trapped in that fucking train station with Dumbledore and no chance of escape. 

He’s gasping so hard he’s wondering how Draco hasn’t turned up to press a hand calmly against his back. Wondering where he’s disappeared to in the middle of the night, since Harry’s bed is empty and Draco’s is still made. When he gets up and puts on his glasses, he notices a note on the foot of his bed. Stuck there with magic so it wouldn’t get kicked off from Harry’s thrashing. 

He swallows hard and opens it, biting so hard on his cheek that he actually does taste blood. 

_Harry,_

_No need for a preface here as you hopefully won’t find this until long after I’ve left. I’ve decided that staying here at Hogwarts isn’t worth the anxiety and the terror it’s causing you. No education, no future prospect, is worth putting you through this torture. Looking at people and knowing they hate who I am and having this Mark on my arm that everyone knows is there...that I could deal with. But you getting mobbed and hurt and attacked? I can’t have that. I won’t let you be hurt because of me and my selfishness._

_You’ve become so important to me that I can’t let this embarrassment go on for you any longer. It may not affect you, but reputation is important and I’m ruining yours._

_I know you will heal, but I don’t think I can. That’s the difference between us, Potter. I’m weak and afraid and you are brave and strong. That's_ _always_ _been the difference. I have to go and I hope you can forgive me for returning home. Just know I’m doing this for me and for you, because I can’t bear to see you becoming an outcast in the place you most belong._

_I have complete faith in you. Good luck,_

_Draco Malfoy_

He gets up and digs through his trunk, looking for something he hasn’t touched all year, out of sheer desperation. Something he’d avoided looking at or thinking about, because it reminds him so deeply of tragedy. Even the texture of it makes his skin crawl and bile rise in the back of his throat. His head feels light, dizzy, strange when he unfolds the paper and he pauses so he doesn’t faint. 

He’s woken up alone and he knows there’s something wrong. How could Draco so easily leave Harry after what they’ve been through together? How could he be so selfish and cowardly to leave only weeks before their graduation test? 

He thinks he’s doing Harry a favour, but he’s actually committing a crime worse than the treason he’d committed during the war. He’s leaving a friend when they’re most in need. 

Hogwarts used to be a home for the lost, a place of magic and wonder. For Draco and for Harry, it used to mean a family with no repercussions. No payments to be made at their expense. But after the war, it, like the two boys, is not the same. 

There’s a silence to it that hadn’t existed before, an unnerving feeling like eyes on the back of your neck, that Harry can’t seem to shake. Like the building itself, built up from near destruction, absorbed some of the malevolence and the violence it had endured. 

Neither Harry nor Draco seem to bear it well where others are thriving. Perhaps it’s because of their close ties to the evil itself, due to Harry’s scar and Draco’s Dark Mark. Or perhaps they’re both so close to falling off the deep end that they’ve picked up an untreatable illness of the mind. 

Either way, being back at Hogwarts after two weeks in the sweet refuge of New Malfoy Manor is torture. It’s hell on earth, but Harry’s sticking it out and so should Draco. 

After, Draco can do whatever he wants with his life, but he _owes_ Harry this. 

Harry feels the parchment, hears it crinkle as he unfolds it. The Marauder’s Map in all its glory. 

He thinks of Fred and George, one dead, the other crippled with grief and missing an ear, of his father and all 3 of his friends, of his father and his traitor. Of Sirius and Remus and James and Peter, all four Marauders. Dead. 

Thinks that if cursed objects exist, Harry’s sure as hell holding one in his hands. 

He raises his wand, breath shaking, heart hammering, and says, “I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.” 

The map comes to life under his wand and the breath catches in his chest as the nicknames rise to the surface. 

The map is inaccurate now, what with the new additions to Hogwarts during its reconstruction. Someone will have to fix the map to honour the memory of those who put in so much work to create it. Maybe one day he will. Maybe his children will. Maybe it will rot into nothingness in a trunk like Harry had planned for it to. 

He searches the old parchment for names, seeing many of his younger classmates in their respective beds, and then spots Draco’s footprints floating around the Quidditch Pitch. 

Harry has no idea what Draco could be doing at half 3 in the morning on a cold January night if he’s supposed to have left. 

He puts on his shoes, throws on his invisibility cloak over his pajamas, and heads out, creeping quietly through the corridors with the map in his hands like he's in sixth year all over. 

He sees Hermione and Ron on the map before he sees them in person, sitting on the chairs in the 8th year common room, and sighs. As he passes them, he listens to what they’re saying, because, why not? They haven’t spoken to him since before Christmas anyway. 

“A pepper-up potion?” Ron’s asking. “Perhaps that’ll do the trick?” 

“No, no. Maybe for a cold, but not for this.” 

Studying. Harry pauses for only a second more to stare at the thin, silver band on Hermione’s ring finger before he books it out the door and into the hallway. The door, no longer the portrait of the fat lady in the pink dress, opens quietly and shuts soundlessly. The new portrait, a woman with eyes like a lion and a dress made from striped animal fur, looks around after the door shuts and scowls. Says something in a language Harry doesn’t speak that is probably an insult. 

He lets the map lead him through the corridors to a secret passageway that he knows leads right out to the pitch. Still, the password rises to the surface as he says it.

Once inside, with the tapestry pulled back into its place, he whispers, “Mischief managed,” and the map goes blank. A haunted piece of plain paper. He folds it back up and tucks it into his pocket as he walks through the tunnel and out toward the pitch. 

Draco’s up in the sky, not quite flying as much as he is floating in one spot mid-air. Looking down at the ground with a solemn look in his eyes and a cigarette in his hand. Harry can see the smoke when he takes a breath. 

“What’re you doing?” Harry asks, wondering if Draco plans to toss himself down. 

From that height, it might kill him. Or he might break a couple bones. 

“Potter?” 

“Who else would it be?” 

Harry slips off his cloak so Draco can see him. 

“Almost forgot about the cloak,” he says as he flies down to the ground. 

He’s fully dressed in a dark coloured suit that fits him like a glove. Shiny black shoes are tied up on his feet and his hair is tousled from the harsh winter wind. He looks impeccable and untouchable, like he doesn’t really exist, like he’s a projection in the wind, bound to disappear when the sun rises. 

“What were you doing?”

Harry can see the dark circles under his eyes, the hollows of his cheeks. Can almost feel the exhaustion seeping off of him. 

“Wanted one last look of the pitch. It’s one of the few places not tainted with bad shit.” 

Harry nods, though he’s not sure he quite believes him. 

He doesn’t say anything for a while. He lets his rage and annoyance fester in his chest like an illness, unchecked by a doctor, until he can bear it no more. Until it spills out of him like water out of a full bathtub. 

While he is angry, his voice is delicate. Fragile. Hard to bear and hard to hear.

“You were gonna leave me here? Leave me to go into that forest alone while you sleep in a warm bed at home with your mum?” 

Draco says nothing. Harry hugs his cloak to his chest, jaw shaking. He’s not going to cry. He isn’t even sure why he feels tears gathering in his eyes. Why the sob starts to build in his chest. 

“Abandon me here in this-this _prison?_ And what, go back home to your mummy and your expensive food and safe life?” 

Draco doesn’t move an inch. Doesn’t even blink. 

Harry takes a step back from him, back from this coward who used to be his best friend. 

_“Coward,”_ his voice shakes, like he’s already crying. “You think you’re protecting me from something I don’t give a _shit_ about when really you’re protecting yourself. How incredibly selfish of you.” 

Maybe Harry’s being the selfish one for wanting Draco to stay, but he doesn’t _care!_ He can’t do this alone. He can’t keep going like this, knowing he’s alone in the world, waking himself up from nightmares with blood in his mouth, on his hands, cold and shaking and alone. Can’t handle smoking off the tower with no one to cast a _Rechauff_ on him when he wants to feel nothing but the bite of cold, winter wind. 

“I have to go,” is all Draco has to say, flatly, somberly. 

“What is this really about? There’s only a few months left! _Please—”_

“I have to go, _Potter.”_

“Potter?” Harry nods his head, practically weeping. “Now I’m just Potter? After we slept in the same bed for months? After I held you and you held me while nightmares tore at us every night? After all the _kissing?”_

“I—” 

“After you kissed me on the forehead and said that you loved me?!” Harry remembers. 

“You were awake?” Draco’s mouth is tense. 

“Yes.” 

“It doesn’t matter. None of this matters. I have to go, _Potter.”_ He says his name like a whip, aching and hard and painful. Like a gift he’s thrust back in Harry’s face, like saliva he’d spit onto Harry’s skin. 

Harry’s face must show the pain, must be absolutely wrecked, because Draco’s mouth softens. He tries to take it back, make his words gentler, but it doesn’t work. Harry starts to get angry again. 

“No, no. It’s okay.” Harry clenches his jaw and his fists, crumbling the letter up into a ball. “I guess old habits die hard, right?”

“I’m sorry—” 

“I can’t do this.” Harry can’t. 

His lungs are burning and his eyes ache and his chest is on fire. He drops Draco’s letter to the ground, crumpled into a tight ball, to wipe at his eyes, embarrassed that he’d cared so much for someone he used to despise so thoroughly. He should’ve trusted his instincts, should’ve listened to his gut feeling the day he met Malfoy. Untrustable. Cowardly. Disgusting. 

“I thought...I thought you’d changed, but I guess I was wrong. You’re just as selfish now as you were then. Have a good life, _Malfoy.”_

Harry slips the cloak back over his shoulders as the tears start to fall. He turns and he walks away, waiting until he’s in the safety of the passageway to sob. He cries for so long that he falls to his knees in exhaustion and weeps so hard he loses his breath. 

He feels like a little boy again, like the first time Dudley threw his dead parents in his face. Like he’s lost everything all over again all for the gain of a stupid, spoilt little boy.

* * *

Harry slips a little further from sanity after that. He goes back to his room and lays in his bed. He doesn’t move for almost a whole day. Doesn’t sleep. Doesn’t think. Just stares at the ceiling and forgets he’s a being because he’s so overloaded. So dead inside. 

The day after that, McGonagall gathers all the remaining eighth years for a meeting in the common room. She specifically hunts Harry down to make sure he attends, leading him from his now single and half empty bedroom down the stairs to join the others. Harry sits on the stairs as far from everyone else as he can and listens, cloak still clutched in his hands, only vaguely paying attention. His thoughts are on the look on Draco’s face, the shape of his mouth, the emptiness in his eyes. His first thought in a day is more painful than any thought he’s ever had before. 

“The Ministry have decided the dates for which you will spend your days in the Forest. Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy will open the exams on the first weekend of April. After that, will be Miss. Granger and Miss. Bones the following weekend and then..."

Harry sighs and stops listening. A few short weeks and he’ll be all alone, choking on memories and death, surrounded by monsters and creatures, in the Forbidden Forest. 

He doesn’t even have the energy to be upset about it today. McGonagall clears her throat and draws Harry back in. 

“The ministry have sent out some guidelines, as well. You will be permitted to take your wand, a bezoar, a few basic potions ingredients that will be given to you on your testing day, a change of clothes, and two pre-brewed potions of your choice—that’s four total—in a bag. Feel free to charm it lighter or bigger on the inside as you see fit, but the contents will be examined before testing. Also, the ministry have introduced new magical wildlife into the Forest, so please be prepared for foreign creatures and venoms! If you think you won’t encounter it, think again! Magical creatures of all types will be placed and removed weekly to maintain the safety of the other students and the diversity of the testing.

“Also, a bezoar is good in a pinch, but the knowledge to avoid the poison altogether is better. So be sure to study. Practice your spell casting. Get a good night’s rest and eat a full meal.” 

Hermione’s hand flies into the air immediately, causing a low groan from the Slytherins. Parkinson’s the only one left, so it’s really just her, half hearted. 

“How will we be graded?” 

“You’ll be monitored in the forest by members of the faculty. We may be hidden in plain sight or perhaps not there at all, but we are watching. Your successes at survival and magic will be counted and your failures will be measured. Grades will go as followed: Outstanding being the highest possible, Acceptable being average, or Troll, which is the lowest and failing grade. More information will be available at the beginning of the testing on the 1st of April. All 8th year students will meet at the edge of the forest in order to cheer on your classmates. Anyone caught interrupting or interfering with the test will receive an immediate Troll with no chance for re-testing.” 

“What if we get into trouble?” Hermione asks. “Or something hurts us?” 

“There will be magical healers in the vicinity at all times. If you are seriously injured or in need of help, shoot red sparks into the sky. We are watching, though, so if you somehow are unable to do so, know we’re on our way. Anything that you are unable to heal yourselves will be healed by one of the healers and, for anything that possibly can’t be immediately remedied, you will be removed from the test.” 

“Will we be permitted to retest if we’re removed?” Hermione asks and McGonagall raises her eyebrows. 

“Yes, but the stakes are higher if you do so. The only two grades available to retest for are Acceptable and Troll. No Outstandings will be granted due to medical emergencies. 

“Any other questions?” Silence. 

Harry senses the meeting is over, so when everyone’s looking away at McGonagall’s tense face, he slips on his invisibility cloak and disappears, unable to bear one more second of this hell.

* * *

Hermione tracks Harry down. 

He’s on the tower again, has been for a very long time, and he’s smoked his lungs to ash. He’s gone through all his weed and his cigarettes and is sitting there, contemplating if the fall will kill him or if he should just go get some more cigs. 

Falling is easier and faster than waiting for death itself, but getting some cigarettes will feel better and quell the shaking of his hands and the cramping of his stomach. Oh, the choices! 

There’s a blanket behind him and his pillow that he _Accio_ -d from his room so he wouldn’t have to move. There's a plate of barely eaten, three day old cheese toasties and a cold cup of tea beside his new bed that a house-elf had mysteriously brought him. 

He’s been there for days. 

He watches the sun rise. He watches the sun set. He gets chilled to the bone every night with no one to cast a _Rechauff_ over his lifeless body. He barely eats or drinks. Just lives on smoke and frigid air and on the snowflakes that fall and gather on the crown of his head. 

Then Hermione shows up, looking so full of life that it actually hurts to look at her. Like the sun, she burns too bright, is too full of life for someone as dead as Harry. 

Something glows at her feet, poured from her wand, like moon dust or glitter. Shining almost as bright as her, the small creature scampers off down the stairs. An otter, maybe. Perhaps even a ferret. 

“There you are,” she says, relieved, and she reaches for him. 

He lets her hug him, but doesn’t hold her back. Can’t really feel his arms to do so even if he wanted to. 

All he feels is nothing. Emptiness. Hollow. Vast, endless exhaustion. Entropy. 

“What’s wrong? Everyone’s been going crazy looking for you! You’ve been gone for days and Draco’s gone, too!” 

Harry says nothing. He has nothing to say. Nothing left to give. 

“Harry, what’s wrong? What’s happened?” She sounds afraid. “Are you okay?” 

Harry just looks up at her, all the emotion in his eyes, as he realizes he should’ve just died in that goddamn forest. Would’ve been easier. He wouldn’t feel like this anymore at least. He’d be at peace. Heaven or hell or neither at all, at least it couldn’t get any worse than this. 

“Harry?” Hermione holds his face in her hands, looking so worried that she might cry. “Talk to me, Harry, please!”

“He left because of me. ” 

“What?” 

“Draco. He left for me.” 

“What do you mean?” 

“I was getting hazed by the other kids, because we’re friends, you know. I could take it. It’s not a big deal that they think I’m a traitor or a twat or whatever, because their opinions don’t matter to me...but...but...” 

“It’s different, for Draco,” Hermione interprets, sort of stroking his hair in a way no one has ever done before. “He was raised to believe in having a good reputation. Most pureblood kids were, because it's a trueblood value, something they passed down to every generation.” 

“Yes...and he took it so personally when those assholes called me a traitor or whatever.” 

“So he left to protect you,” Hermione says, voice softening, eyebrows tilting in pity. “To keep you safe.” 

“He must’ve seen what happened in the hallway,” Harry whispers, the wind burning his cheeks, drying his lips to pain. 

“And he just couldn’t do it anymore.” 

Harry nods and he starts to cry again. 

“I don’t know what to do without him here. I feel like...like I’m suffering through life for no good reason and he was one of the few things that helped lessen the pain...and now he’s gone and I’m still here and he doesn’t want to be friends anymore and I’m falling apart.” 

“Oh, Harry,” she whispers, squeezing him tighter. For once, Hermione has no words.

“I wish I’d just died in that fucking forest and saved the both of us a lot of pain.” 

“Make me a promise,” Hermione says, suddenly serious. 

Harry pauses to wipe the snot off his nose and looks at her, aching and tired and so endlessly alone. 

“Promise me you’ll see a mind healer.” 

“A mind healer?” He says, almost repugnantly. 

Generally, mind healers are incompetent and overworked and underpaid by the Ministry. They’re so unimportant and forgotten that they don’t even have a proper name. A proper title or place in wizarding society or even at St. Mungos. They’re pointless. 

“I know someone who can help you. Wanting to die like that...it’s not normal. Feeling so sick with guilt for simply living is not healthy. You have to work to fix your brain, Harry, just like you would a collapsed lung or a ruptured appendix.”

“How do you know?” 

“Because I’m seeing the same healer and she’s helped me. Brewed me a potion I take once a week to combat the nightmares I was having.”

“They have potions like that?” Harry’s so afraid to hope that he doesn’t, can’t because hope takes too much energy and he has none left. 

Just holds his breath and waits for her to answer. The sky grows darker by the second. Midnight, maybe earlier. 

“It’s not a permanent fix, but yes. I can take it until I get better. Until the nightmares lessen.” 

“Did she really help?” 

“Absolutely.” 

* * *

Ron shows up eventually and Harry realizes Hermione had sent her Patronus to tell him where they were. The little glowing otter, still unchanged after all she has seen, after all she has been through. 

Harry wonders if his still embodies his father, still stands tall and proud even when Harry is small and weak. 

“Harry,” he says, looking frazzled and surprisingly good. 

Looks like he’s taken his anguish and built himself a better body with it where Harry let his tear him apart.

“You look rough, mate.” 

“Thanks,” Harry says flatly as Hermione elbows Ron in the ribs. “You look great.” 

“Yeah, well Hermione’s got us on this regimen for the forest test that caused this.” 

“A new diet, exercises, therapy, studying. All in order to get Os on our tests.” Hermione smiles. 

“So much studying.” Ron sounds exhausted, in a healthy way. “We study all day and all night. Ugh. Can’t wait to get this shit over with. Anyways, come on.” 

“Where are we going?” Harry asks, feeling more tired than he has ever felt.

“Mum wants to see you. Wants to make sure you’re alright.” 

Alright is a funny word to use for what Harry is and looks like. Anxiety flares up in his chest, but he’s not sure why. He doesn’t not want to see Mrs. Weasley, but he’s hesitant. Doesn’t want her to see him, more like. 

“She Floo-d in when McGonagall said you’d gone missing. Special permissions.” 

“How many days was I gone?” Maybe 2 or 3. No more than that surely. 

“Almost a week, mate. McGonagall called everyone.” 

A week? How isn’t Harry dead?

“Who’s left to call other than you guys?” He laughs, miserable, thinking of his dead family and of Draco. “Everyone else is dead or gone.”

“Harry,” Hermione says softly, “she called on all the old Gryffindors. Everyone from last year who she could get a hold of. Andromeda and Teddy. The Dursleys, even. Narcissa Malfoy offered to help conduct a formal search.” 

“And Malfoy? _Draco,_ I mean?” Harry’s afraid to even ask. 

“Returned home, I presume.” 

“‘Course.” Harry can barely say the word. 

Of course Malfoy returned home. 

Harry wishes he could be happy for him, but he’s selfish enough to know he can’t. Draco left Harry alone here for no reason other than his own vanity. His stupid Pureblood background seems to follow him no matter how hard he tries to avoid it. 

“Let’s go,” Ron says again, helping Harry to his feet. “McGonagall wants proof we’ve found you. Probably wants to give you a good talking to.” 

“Christ.” 

Harry can barely walk. He hasn’t stood in almost a week, has been left to sit and lay on a cold, stone floor, so he’s so dizzy and cramped that his legs barely work. Ron puts one arm over his shoulders and Hemione holds him at his waist. 

Together, they climb down the rickety steps of the decrepit Astronomy tower and back into the castle. 

Harry’s heart is pounding loud in his tired ears as he sees all of the Weasleys gathered in the corridor, looking around worriedly and talking rapidly as they search hiding holes and empty classrooms. 

“Harry!” Cries Mrs. Weasley, running towards him with tears in her eyes. “Oh, dear boy, you scared the _shite_ out of us!” 

She holds him closely in her arms and weeps over him like he’s dead already. Like he died up on the tower and she only has his lifeless body to grasp at. He has tears in his eyes, too, and is so overcome with emotion that he clings back to her, full on sobbing with madness and anxiety. 

“My boy,” she whispers, “I’m so glad you’re alright.” 

“I’m not.” Harry can’t lie to her. 

He physically can’t. So he won’t. 

She pulls back to look at him, a strange emotion in her eyes, before she nods like she gets it. 

“Me neither,” George says softly, at his mum’s side, hand on Harry's shoulder. “I’m not sure anyone is.” 

Harry sniffles, wipes the tears off of his face, and sighs. Mr. Weasley is the next to squeeze what little life he has left out of him. Then Headmistress McGonagall tears him a new arsehole for running off and worrying everyone. 

He has nothing to say for himself after her scolding, so he hangs his head a little low, shoulders hunched, bleeding shame from every pore. 

“I am glad you are okay, Mr. Potter,” she says softly, like she’s speaking to a friend she hasn’t seen in quite some time. Like Harry was her friend a long time ago and she’s forgotten how to talk with him. “But you are forbidden from leaving the castle until further notice.” 

Harry looks up at her with wide, panicked eyes. Trapped inside these aching halls, being crushed by all the deaths. No escape. No escape. No escape. 

“I understand.” 

“Good. Now once you're finished here, go see Poppy in the infirmary. Let her give you a onceover.” 

Harry has no plans on doing that, on letting Poppy see how far he’s slipped, but he nods anyway. 

“Good night then.” And she goes, graceful as ever, into the darkness of the hallway. 

Harry doesn’t have to explain to the Weasleys what happened, because Hermione lies for him. Covers for him beautifully nuanced in a way he never could have managed himself by saying there was a miscommunication, a lost letter that said Harry was going on a trip. She lies so smoothly, so easily, that Harry wonders what other lies she’s told. 

They give one another hugs again and then the Weasleys are off, too, leaving just the original trio behind. 

“Let’s go to bed,” Ron says and yawns in the middle of his sentence. “I’m knackered.” 

Harry yawns, too, and nods. Perhaps he’ll try one of Malfoy’s potions tonight in order to blackout completely. Dreamless sleep or Draught of Peace or maybe he’ll press his wand against his chest and say those two unforgivable words and get lots of rest for eternity. 

Avada Kedavra. If it would even work.

* * *

Harry wakes to the blinding sunlight in his eyes. His curtains are drawn back and the sun shines bright as ever, even for late winter. It’s beautiful. 

“Wakey wakey,” says Ron, a shadow against the bright light. “Time to go hunt down Malfoy.” 

“Malfoy?” 

“Yes, that arsehole.” 

“Why?” Harry furrows his brow and sits up. 

He’s a little lightheaded from the potion and exhaustion, but he’s alright. He’s awake and he’s alive. 

“Because you’re miserable and so is he, so why not be miserable together? Plus, The Prophet published another article that may fuck things up a little more.” 

“Oh, bloody hell. What now?” 

“I better just let you read it. C’mon.”

* * *

**ONCE A DEATH EATER, ALWAYS A DEATH EATER: THE BEGINNING OF THE SECOND WIZARDING WAR**

_By Rita Skeeter_

_We are all familiar with the death eating scum who followed the Dark Lord in the war, but are you aware they walk among you? They have changed their outward appearances, have hidden their hate behind facades of kindness, and grow more evil by the day. Led by Pureblood Draco Malfoy, these new pseudo Death Eaters have more hate and more power than even V*ldemort’s crew. With secrecy on their side, they have infiltrated us again and lurk, waiting for the right moment to kill all the impure bloods and dispose of their bodies like trash. Draco Malfoy is spearheading the operation by trying to do away with his biggest nemesis: Harry Potter, the saviour of the wizarding world._

_He has become Harry Potter’s friend, as seen in the photographs below, and is sucking his life force out day after day to finally put an end to his power. These Pseudo Death Eaters, now called Death Beaters according to an unnamed source, are going to take over by taking our Golden Boy! We have to stop them before they kill us all! I saw we take to the streets and end all Death Eaters for once and for all!_

Oh for fuck’s sake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave me some feedback?? Thanks! Final chapter will be in the forest and up soon (ish).


	5. retribution

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [ here's a spotify playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/15gH0WdIsOLVQZqIbwcZZl) full of songs that inspired this fic, in case you were curious. I'll link the songs in the fic, too, in case you don't use Spotify!
> 
> If you listen to one song, please listen to the one in the forest that the creature sings towards the end! It's haunting and fits the mood and will help you better understand what's going through their heads!
> 
> Finally, this is the (almost) end. I split this because there was so much in this last chapter that it was too much. So here's the final chapter and the next one is the epilogue! 
> 
> Thanks for reading and all that. Epilogue is being edited as we speak, so expect it within 24-48 hours!
> 
> Also in case it's not clear: fuck terfs, fuck jkr for being one, and also fuck the cops for being racist af

Ron sends out an owl to new Malfoy Manor telling them they’ll be arriving sometime in the evening. Apparently, Pigwidgeon is still unchanged after everything, because he flies around the Great Hall for several moments to garner attention and then preens under all the students’ curious-eyed gazes in the exact way he used to. 

It's adorable. 

Harry laughs a little when Pig ruffles through his hair—now long beyond the point of shaggy—and hoots from the new perch. It’s the first time Harry's felt any lightness at all in his chest. 

Then Pig is gone, doing a triple axle mid-air and disappearing through an open window with an immense amount of elegance. Harry’s smile fades, but he feels it in his chest like the waves of a warm summer breeze: here one moment and then he's gone the next. 

“As soon as we get a response,” Ron says, “we’ll head over, yeah?” 

“Yeah.” Harry nods. 

“Now eat your eggs,” he says firmly. 

And so Harry does. Or he tries, at least. 

* * *

Draco’s been home for a week and still wakes up searching his bed for Potter with his fingertips in pure desperation for his company. It’s the first thing he does when the snake nightmares of lullabies and death tear through his chest and leave him gasping and choking on the memory of the taste of his own blood. The second thing he does is shut his eyes as hard as he can and ball his hands into fists, knowing there’s nothing to be done. That no matter how he feels he cannot ever be selfish enough to return to Potter’s side. 

He can pine and whine and _cry_ like a petulant child, but he can never return, never do that much damage to an already damaged boy who obviously deserves much better. 

So he goes about the motions of this new existence he calls his. Thankfully, his mother is more understanding than ever and allows him to grieve his loss from the darkness of his bedroom. He doesn’t leave except to use the bathroom and to sneak out into the halls to listen to his mother and Patches play eerie songs on the piano that echo throughout the manor like an elegy for Draco’s broken heart. 

Before the war, she’d stopped playing altogether and their house had been silent and dangerous, save for the agonized screams of the innocent begging for mercy Voldemort didn’t have to give. The Dark Lord had forbidden the piano as the sound bothered the ears of his snake, Nagini, and made her irate as there was only[ one song](https://youtu.be/4Uxtf8d7D-c) she truly enjoyed. The house had been dead inside, much like Draco himself, because no one dared oppose Voldemort, their dark Lord. 

No one except for Harry fucking Potter. 

Draco manages to hunt down some cigarettes in a shop in Muggle London and spends the early morning hours smoking them from the roof of his new home, of the one untainted by blood and tears and death. He listens to upbeat Britney Spears songs and watches the sky light up. 

When the sun rises, Draco’s eyes always water and there’s nothing he can do to stop it, so he just. Cries. As sunlight warms his numb and lonely body, frozen by the still icy winds, feeling nothing and everything all at once. Like a fleck of sand on a beach, alone in his differences, tormented eternally by destructive waves, forever lost among other things. 

Listening to the music Potter gave him for Christmas does not help. It’s upbeat, but the sound is so deeply tied to Draco’s sorrow that he sobs when he hears it. Begs his mother not to play it on the piano, despite[ _Autumn Goodbye_](https://youtu.be/81bMbW7_CDg) being her favourite song “ever” apparently. 

The day Draco sees a small, feathery owl fly into the manor, he slips off of the roof and almost drops his Walkman to its death. He hangs onto the edge and contemplates if it really matters if he falls or not. Perhaps to his mother it would, but she would recover. She’d get over the betrayal of his suicide or accident or whatever it would be labelled as as she has the betrayal from her husband. 

No one would miss him for long and that’s just a fact. A sad, sobering, realistic fact. 

But because he’s a Malfoy and he has too much pride to die falling off an icy roof like Father Christmas after one too many glasses of spiked milk, he summons his broom and saves his own arse. When he manages to return to his room, he’s in a proper state and frenzied. 

There’s a letter on his bed in scratchy, uneven handwriting on wrinkled, thin parchment. He doesn’t immediately recognize it. 

**_Malfoy,_ **

**_We will be stopping by sometime this evening. Don’t curse us or we’ll curse you back. Also, Harry’s a fucking wreck and I’m pissed at you for doing this to him, so plan on making it up to us for a long time._ **

**_Coldest regards,_ **

**_Ron Weasley and friends_ **

Draco stares at the paper for longer than necessary, trying to make sense of the words. Since the war ended, he’s had trouble reading. He’s not quite sure why, but perhaps it’s his anxiety or maybe he’s going fucking insane, but he has to scan through it for quite some time before the meaning takes hold. 

Draco is going to see Potter again. Potter is friends with his old friends again. A red-headed Weasel is going to kick his arse. 

Draco flies into action, tearing through the house in a run so fast he might as well be flying. He comes to a complete stop in front of his mother, panting and frantic, and cries out. 

“Harry’s coming and I don’t know what to do!” 

“Oh, dear,” Narcissa says softly, thoughtfully, like the earth isn't crumbling to pieces beneath Draco’s feet. “Who else?” 

“Weasley and Granger, I presume.” Her calm is unsettling. 

Draco wants her to be in as much of a state as he is, but she never gets like that. Has never, really, except for the many times he's almost died. Perhaps, with how close Draco’s inevitable end seems to be, she should be in a constant state of frenzy, but maybe that’s too much for her all at once. 

“Perhaps we should have a dinner party, then? Draft an invitation and send it back with an owl. Say 7?” 

“Bloody hell,” Draco says dramatically, still out of breath. 

“You built your bed. Now you have to sleep in it,” she says with flourish and some level of smugness.

She’s recently been integrating Muggle phrases into her vocabulary with unyielding determination and has been outright failing at it. The work she’s putting in to overcome a lifetime of bigotry is truly the more successful thing out of them all, though. 

“You know what?” She smiles. “I’ll handle it. You go get dressed, okay, love? Let Patches know we’ll be having guests so he can prepare himself. You know how bad his anxiety can get.” 

Draco takes a cautious look at his mother, feeling uncomfortably anxious himself, and nods. Turns on his heel and scampers off towards Patches’ room. 

* * *

By the time Pigwidgeon returns, Harry’s gotten tired of sitting around doing nothing. He’s anxious and nervous and his heart is in his fucking throat. 

Ron and Hermione are sitting across from him in the library, arguing about the ability of the Ministry to include XXXXX rated creatures into the forests. Ron thinks it’d be “sick” to see a wampus cat or a manticore and Hermione thinks that they would never put anything more dangerous than an XXXX in the forest. Harry is, at the moment, inclined to agree with Hermione on this, but it _would_ be cool to see a manticore. Of course, he wouldn’t want to be fucking eaten by one, but. Semantics. 

Then Pigwidgeon is flying in at full speed, a letter clutched in his tiny feet. He pirouettes and lands elegantly on Hermione’s wrist, dropping the letter in her lap. 

“Good job, Pig,” Hermione says affectionately, reaching out to stroke his feathers. “Now go before Crookshanks comes looking.” 

Crookshanks made a reappearance after Harry’s most recent _dis_ appearance. He’d vanished from the Burrow sometime after the war and had been missing, presumed dead, for many months. Then, one day, Hermione says he showed up at the foot of her bed, purring his little heart out as he burrowed into her scarf and batted at the tassels. 

Loyalty is a trait that Harry most admires, so his fondness grows for the smushed-faced cat after he hears the tale. 

“What’s it say?” Harry asks, sitting up. 

Admittedly, he’s a bit nervous. What if Draco tells them not to come? What if he’s already done something irreversible? 

“It’s...an invitation?” Hermione’s brow is furrowed. “For dinner tonight. Black tie, I think.” 

“Bloody hell,” Ron curses. “Why is it _always_ black tie?!”

“We best get dressed, if we want to be on time,” Hermione says succinctly. “Come along.” 

Harry’s so anxious his heart pounds in his ears. His lungs are on fire. 

All he wants is to make sure Draco’s safe, that he’s out of harm’s way, that he’s at Harry’s side. Somehow, he’ll have to figure out how to make sure everyone gets the message that Draco’s not like that anymore, that he’s working on himself and succeeding. 

“Where are we going?” Ron asks, looking miserable. “I’m not done with my sandwich.” 

_“Black tie,_ Ron. We need to look our best for the Malfoys.” 

“Shopping? I _hate_ shopping.” He stands regardless and rolls his eyes, linking his hand with Hermione’s. “Leave it to Malfoy to make us all miserable as we attempt to make his life better.” 

The silver band gleems in the dying light of the fire and Harry’s throat tightens. He wants to ask, but can’t. What would he even say? So he just stands up, too, and follows them through the castle towards the secret passageway to Hogsmeade. 

Only when he’s standing on the precipice does he remember McGonagall’s words from the night prior. Forbidden from leaving the castle. 

Technically, he isn’t leaving, though, right? He isn’t Disapparating or using an exit to make an escape or taking a car. He’s just going down a corridor that leads somewhere else magically. Hopefully, the technicality is enough to keep him out of detention and off of McGonagall's bad side. 

So he takes a deep breath and climbs through. 

* * *

When Harry and his friends show up to the Malfoys, it’s quiet. The house flickers with candlelight and soft, delicate[ music](https://youtu.be/PAuKSdys_Sw). It sounds like Narcissa’s playing the piano, like a sad song with pain in its notes. It emanates from the house and lends a spooky, forlorn quality to the entire property. It makes the hair on the back of Harry’s neck stand up. 

“Bloody hell,” Ron says as they approach the door. “Could they try any harder to be so freaky?”

Patches answers to Harry’s reluctant knock. He grins up at him, all blue eyed and crooked teeth, and hugs his legs tight. 

“Harry!” He says happily. “You have returned!” 

Harry’s smile is as fragile and eerie as the piano music. He kneels down to hug Patches properly, the way he deserves. 

“I have, Patches. It’s lovely to see you again.” 

“Narcissa is just inside! Please, let me take you to her.” 

Patches grabs Harry’s hand and leads them through the house. 

Harry turns back to give a reassuring look to Hermione and Ron who are dressed impeccably. 

After the war, they both received a stipend from the Department of Magic, as did Harry and every other child who played a part in the final War. It’s enough money to build a life on and it seems Hermione and Ron are doing just that. 

“Harry,” Narcissa says warmly, standing from the piano bench mid-song, dressed in an elegant gown made of delicately spun gold silk. “I’m so happy you’ve returned.” 

She steps toward Harry, a woman as beautiful as the passage of time itself, and hugs him to her, warm and inviting and somehow loving. Her embrace feels a lot like Mrs. Weasley’s, though she smells like sharp daisies and sparkling cider. She whispers into his ear as they hug for a long moment. 

“Work this out,” is all she says, in a quiet and strong voice. 

Harry’s determined to do so. 

He pulls away from the strength and warmth of her embrace and smiles, nods. He’s going to bring Draco back come hell or high water. 

“Patches, dear, would you tell Draco his guests have arrived?” 

Patches nods enthusiastically and Disapparates on the spot, even though Draco’s room is not that far. Harry smiles despite himself. 

“Welcome,” Narcissa says to Ron and Hermione, who are standing together, looking awkward. “I hope you’re hungry.” 

“Bloody starved,” Ron says dramatically, reaching out to shake Narcissa’s outstretched hand. “Thanks for the invitation.” 

“According to Draco, we didn’t have much choice.” She laughs and it’s the perfect kind of laugh to go with the joke. 

How one person could be so elegant and effortless, Harry doesn’t know. She amazes him every time. 

“You have a lovely home,” Hermione says, even though she’s been here before. “Was that[ Summer’s End](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAuKSdys_Sw) by Yamazaki you were playing?” 

“It was,” Narcissa says, looking pleasantly surprised. “Do you play?”

Harry doesn’t know much about music, so he drops out of the conversation and tries to spot Draco from around the corner. When he does, he’s startled silent. 

Draco looks godly. He looks angelic and evil and snarky and beautiful. His suit is all black, from the tie to the socks and the cufflinks, and fitted around to fill in the absence of all of his curves so he looks impeccable. 

Harry's breath catches as he enters, looking as regal as a king and as evil as the devil himself. 

“Potter,” he says firmly, but his breath quivers at the end. 

It’s a slight sound, a waver in his facade, and Harry grabs onto it like a lifeline. Draco is not as untouchable as he seems, not as inhuman as his face may seem. Harry can do this. 

“Let’s talk, yeah?” 

“And then we’ll eat,” Narcissa adds. “Let me tell you two about what Patches and I have come up for dinner tonight…” 

Draco leads Harry through the corridors of new Malfoy Manor as Narcissa talks with Hermione and Ron. Draco doesn’t pause to make sure he’s following or to see if he’s wandered off, because he knows Harry knows this place. He spent two weeks here with them and knows a lot more about them than they do about Harry. 

“I don’t know why you came here,” Draco says softly, like he’s in pain. “I told you not to come for me.”

“How could I leave you here when you so obviously deserve a place at my side in that goddamn forest?” 

Draco doesn’t pause his walking, but his shoulders tense up. He turns another corner and Harry begins to realize where they’re going. 

“We’ve both done things that should have ended with our deaths, Draco, and the fact that we’re still here means that we’re meant to be, I think.” 

“I don’t believe in _fate.”_ His back is as straight and stiff as his words; he pulls open his bedroom door. 

“Then believe in _me._ Come back so we can do this together.” 

Draco finally turns to look at him, dashing and tragic in his beautiful suit, and he looks furious and sad. It’s the same look he’d given Harry before Harry almost murdered him in the bathroom in sixth year, right down to the tears in his eyes, and it breaks Harry’s heart. 

“Draco,” he whispers and his voice, like his heart, is weak and distraught. “Come here.” 

Draco’s face changes, finally, relieving some of Harry’s guilt and anxiety, and then he hesitates. 

“Why?” 

“You don’t trust me?” Harry levels his eyes with Draco’s, half smirking in a way he hasn’t done for a long time. “After all the nights we spent in bed with each other?”

“I trust you.” Terse and unforgiving. Relentless. 

“Then come here.” 

Draco sighs, furrows his brow, and then returns the arrogant, snarky look as he walks towards Harry. His gate is impeccable, but Harry can see anxiety in his shoulders, in the way he swings his arms. He’s come to know this boy so well that he does it without thinking. 

“What?” He scowls. 

Harry embraces him, squeezing him so tightly it hurts his weak and aching muscles. Draco doesn’t hold him back for a long moment, arms tight to his sides, but he doesn’t push Harry away either. 

“Have I ever apologized,” Harry whispers fiercely, “for the incident in 6th year?” 

“If we’re going to start apologizing, we’d honestly never stop.” Draco’s voice is still tense as he pulls back. 

Harry lets him, but only because he has to see his face. 

“I…”

“Potter,” he says and then immediately corrects himself, “Harry, I mean, I can’t just come back.” 

“Yes, you can.” 

“But what would they say?” 

_“Who?”_ Harry’s brow furrows; he shrugs his shoulders. “The ones who were picking on you? They’ll say nothing and if they do, who cares? Fuck them. Their opinions don’t matter...and neither does their hatred.” 

Draco sighs for a long, hard moment, grits his teeth and seems to relent. Finally. 

“Good,” Harry grins, feeling better already. “Let’s go eat dinner before Ron thinks you’ve murdered me.” 

“Me murder you?” Draco scoffs, practically balking. “Please. I’m _harmless.”_

He pushes past Harry and stalks through the door, posture perfect, shoulders straight, beautiful as ever. He seems more anxious somehow, though, so Harry frowns at him. 

Maybe it’s selfish of him, but he wants Draco at his side. He _needs_ him there. And Harry reckons he deserves his chance at being selfish for once.

He just wishes there was a way to make sure Draco didn’t suffer for his greediness. 

* * *

Their dinner is excellent and cooked to perfection. Some kind of Italian pasta, Harry thinks, with a cheesy green sauce and then tiramisu for dessert. 

Harry eats as much as he can bear, which is not a lot honestly, but compared to his recent meals, it’s like he’s bingeing. 

Ron and Hermione somehow get along with Draco and Narcissa perfectly. They discuss music and S.P.E.W (Patches is himself a free elf, apparently, that Narcissa hired from his newspaper ad and earns money for his time and effort, like Dobby used to) and the possibilities in this new Dark Lord Free World. 

Harry pretends to play along like a good boy, because Narcissa is being a great host, but he’s just not there. He can’t be. Not when McGonagall could notice he’s missing at any moment and Draco’s still worried he’ll ruin Harry’s reputation and he’s due to return to the Forbidden Forest where he almost died and he’s freaking the fuck out because his best friends are getting married and neither of them have mentioned it to him in the slightest. 

Life is pure fucking chaos right now and Harry isn’t sure how to fix it. At least he fixed the Draco problem, for the most part. 

After dessert, Harry helps Draco clean up the dishes and wash them magically, which feels somehow wasteful. There’s a dishwasher for a reason and it’s not like the Malfoys can’t afford to use it, you know? 

Once finished, Draco steps close to Harry to place a plate into the cabinet beside his head and presses him into the counter. Whilst Harry’s looking at him breathless, Draco smirks and steps even closer. 

“I missed you, too, Potter,” is what he says. “God, you look good in that suit.” 

It’s the same suit Narcissa gave him for Christmas, but with a black button-up instead. It fits him almost the same, if not a bit looser, and he still feels good in it. 

Draco leans in close, mouth so close to Harry’s, and pauses. Waits for something and then gets it when Harry leans up to close the space, to fit their mouths together. Then Draco steps away and saunters out of the kitchen, grinning wickedly as he goes, leaving Harry breathless and wanting for more. 

Bastard. 

* * *

Draco’s return to the 8th year common room is one of relief. Pansy pretends she hadn’t missed him and refuses to meet his eyes at first. Ignores him almost completely until Draco calls her name once. Then she cracks and says, “Well, it’s about damn time.” 

McGonagall shows up before Harry tries to drag Draco upstairs. It’s getting quite late, but what does it matter? School isn’t important anymore. Harry’s not even sure what day of the week it is. 

McGonagall practically grabs him by his shirt collar to stop his escape. Perhaps she even uses magic, because Harry’s dragged back a bit. Turns to look at her, wondering if she’ll be mad and what punishments she’ll assign him. 

But her face is neutral, not restrained. Suspicious, but not decided.

“Mr. Potter,” she starts and she’s calm, “Mr. Malfoy seems to have made a reappearance.” 

“Oh, yes,” Harry says pleasantly. “Ron sent him a letter and managed to convince him to return.” 

Not necessarily a lie. In fact, it’s the truth. Ron did send the Malfoys a letter. Someone _did_ convince him to return. 

“I see. And you didn’t disobey my orders?” 

“Not at all.” Sorta. Kinda. Somewhat. Not really. Maybe. 

“Very well, then. Good night, Mr. Potter, Mr. Malfoy.” And then she turns and walks away. 

Harry may be mistaken, but he thinks he sees her smirking slightly as she turns the corner to push through the portrait door. Maybe she’s happy Draco has returned or perhaps she knows Harry’s been up to his shenanigans again and is happy about it. Either way, he gets away with it. 

Harry grabs Draco’s hand, winds his fingers with his, and runs up the stairs, tugging him behind. Draco fights the running at first by dragging his feet a little to uphold his dignity in front of the others, but once they’ve turned the corner so no one can see, he bursts into a run, nearly cutting Harry off in his zeal. 

They’re both in no shape to run, so they’re easily winded by the time they reach their room, which isn’t truly that far away from the common room. Harry leans against the door frame after shutting the door and pants, absolutely exhausted. He really can’t wait to fucking sleep. 

With any luck, the nightmares won’t be so bad. Not with Draco at his side. 

Harry looks up at him, then, wondering if he knows how much he truly means to Harry. Wonders if he gets how his presence is the only thing that’s kept him going for months. Wonders if he even has to say it, then decides he does, because obviously Draco’s become rather thick-headed since the war. 

“What?” Draco asks, smiling softly, gently. 

It’s a smile for only Harry. The kind only he should ever get. Something open and delicate and entirely too intimate for just friends. 

“I’m kind of in love with you,” Harry says whilst staring at him, “but I don’t want to scare you by telling you yet.” 

“Don't you know I’m fearless? I think I can handle it.” 

“Then, fine. I’m in love with you.” 

Draco gives him an appraising look, one filled with admiration and endearment and relief, and then says: 

“I’m in love with you, too, you idiot.” And steps forward to kiss him. 

Harry winds his hands in Draco’s soft hair and kisses him back. 

* * *

Draco kisses him for a long time, until Harry’s wishing he wasn’t so exhausted so they could keep going, but he physically can’t. 

He ate too much at Narcissa’s and it’s made him sleepy. That plus all the stress and anxiety and worry and sleepless nights adds up to a mess of exhaustion. He’s practically dozing off whilst a cute boy is trying to make out with him on his bed and it’s so embarrassing. Well, it would be if he wasn’t too tired to feel embarrassed. 

Apparently, though, he isn’t too tired to get hard, which is weird after so long. He’d begun to think his dick would never work, so to feel it like that again is bizarre to say the least. 

“Draco,” he whispers and his eyes are shut. 

Draco laughs, but draws back a little, “Good night, Harry,” and kisses him once more on the forehead. 

Harry thinks about nothing and falls asleep. 

* * *

Time begins to fly by. Now that Harry has made a point out of showing how forgiven Draco truly is, no one bothers him. No one even looks at him anymore, which relieves Harry to no end.

Harry and Draco have a sort of undefined relationship where they’re in love with each other and kiss a lot and sometimes have to take cold showers to hide the fact that they’re both turned on because neither of them are ready to talk about the implications there. Which is fine. 

Harry doesn’t mind taking an icy shower as long as Draco is as comfortable as can be. 

Plus, the nightmares haven’t stopped for either of them. If anything, the threat of the danger of the forest brings them on stronger, more often, more vehemently. Some days, the smell of food makes Harry gag from the potent nightmares and the sleepless nights. Sometimes Draco vomits in the wee hours of the morning from dreams about lessons with his father and a song Voldemort once tortured his mother to. Sometimes they clutch each other because the other option is knees on the tiles and mouth filled with bile, of screams into the dark, suffocating silence of their bedroom. 

Winter turns to early spring and the snow stops. 

Harry’s done his best for the year, but frankly, he couldn’t give less of a shit. There weren’t any exams to study for anyway and he’s already survived the Dark Lord, so what can this forest show him that’s any worse than the creature who haunts his dreams? Than his foster parents who locked him in the closet and starved him for days?

Draco’s of the same mind, so if anything strange does show up in the forest, they’re both fucked. To soothe any worry, though, Harry does at least read up on uncommon, but not too dangerous creatures (XXX) in case they’ve decided to surprise them. The others are mostly certain the Ministry wouldn’t truly endanger their lives by putting anything more dangerous than a griffin in the forest, but Harry isn’t of the same mind. 

This is the same Ministry that considers werewolves half-breeds, that forced muggleborns to sign a registry, that fostered the elitism that killed 15% of the wizarding world and housed corrupt leaders for generations and then allowed them to get away with it. Then Hermione shrugs, giving in because what can it hurt?, and they open the book to XXXX and XXXXX. 

Hermione begins to share his worry as they read about lethifolds that hunt you in your sleep and runespoors with venomous fangs and incredible intelligence. They look for ways to fight off these creatures and come up almost completely empty handed. 

A Patronus may work against the lethifold, but it hunts while its prey is sleeping, so it’s pretty impossible to use. A runespoor? Who fucking knows. 

Harry’s not even sure if he can _produce_ a patronus anymore, so he’s pretty sure he’ll just die. Draco’s never even done one before and so he’s probably in the same boat, so they’re fucked. Oh, well. 

McGonagall calls a meeting early in the morning on the final day of classes. 

Harry’s just vomited into the toilet when she’s rapping her knuckles on the door to call him and Draco down. He’s had a particularly volatile nightmare about a juvenile nundu who stalked him through the night, silent as a cat, until he was too weak to go on. Just as the creature stepped over his exhausted body, it breathed toxic cat breath into his face. The smell combined with the knowledge that his death was imminent—whether from the infectious disease in the air or the _nundu’s_ razor sharp teeth and claws—woke him up violently, scrambling up from the bed, and immediately forced bile into his throat. 

When he rinses out his mouth and brushes his teeth, he joins the rest of the 8th years in the common room. He sits on the stairs like he had last time, but he isn’t alone this time. Hermione and Ron sit on the bottom step and Draco’s on the second to last with Pansy. Harry sits down between the two, squeezing in because the third step is too far away to hear, and snorts at Pansy’s protestations. 

“Hello, students,” McGonagall says, looking regal and perhaps a bit proud. “I’m glad you’ve all stuck it out and made it this far. Tomorrow begins the first weekend of testing. Mr. Potter, Mr. Malfoy, I assume you’re both fully prepared.” 

Harry nods his head once and Draco does the same, sharing a look that communicates how unready they truly are. 

Harry could have a million years to prepare and he’d still never willingly step foot into the forest again.

“I’m just calling this meeting to wish you luck and to tell you that you must have your possessions submitted by midnight tonight so they can be checked over by a professor. Any instances of cheating or bad sportsmanship will not be tolerated and will result in an immediate Troll. If there are any questions—” 

“What if we can’t brew the potion ourselves?” Asks Michael Corner, Ron’s partner. 

“As far as the Ministry are concerned, you should have had all the knowledge to brew your necessary potions by yourself. If, say, time was an issue, potions can be brought in or purchased. What potion would you be unable to brew?” 

_“Felix felicis.”_

McGonagall sighs a little, deflates. Loses a bit of the pride that was shown so plainly on her face. 

“Any luck-enhancing potions are not allowed and are considered illicit for these—and most other—intents and purposes. That is why you don’t have access to all of the ingredients, Mr. Corner. For any potion deemed necessary by the Ministry, you’ve had the supplies and recipe necessary to brew it in the potions classroom.” 

“Thank you, headmistress.” He sounds a little trite.

“Any other questions?” A pause. “Good. One last thing: you will enter the forest through a one-way entrance. The exit will require you to traverse the woods and come to a predetermined location in the centre of the forest where a Portkey shaped as a unicorn statue will transport you to safety. You should be able to map your way to it with a simple directions spell, which you all should already know. Any further questions will be answered in the morning. Good night, students.” 

She makes a hasty exit, probably tired and trying to prepare for the stresses the weekend is bound to bring, and everyone pauses for a moment until the portrait seals up behind her. When she’s for sure gone, Seamus Finnigan, who has grown surprisingly introverted after the war, lifts 2 full bottles of firewhiskey and shouts, “Let’s fucking drink!” 

Harry looks over at his friends, at his fellow eighth years, and he grins, despite himself. He hasn’t been drunk off firewhiskey in a little while and wants to feel the rush and fire of it once again. Who fucking cares what tomorrow or this weekend will bring? Harry needs to forget everything and be free. Fuck it all. 

Draco is looking a little green, perhaps worried or anxious, and declines a shot when a bottle makes its way around to them, taking a mildly alcoholic butterbeer instead. Harry takes the shot and then another before he passes it on to Ron who drinks and passes it on and on and on. Hermione wants no part in drinking and huffs at even the thought of firewhisky, too busy preparing for her weekend next Saturday. Susan, her partner, is not of the same mind, drinking so much whiskey Harry doesn’t even try to keep track. She stumbles around, dancing on her own, babbling nonsense to anyone who will listen, mostly to Harry and Draco who stand by the fireplace. It’s the funniest thing Harry’s ever seen and she inexplicably makes Harry happy. Her lightness, her joy. It fills up the hole in his chest that usually feels so empty it hurts. 

After a while, she seems to calm down, to be deeply in thought. And then she shushes everyone with the spell _Silencée!_ which is tricky to use on people when sober, let alone when drunk, but it works for her. Fortunately, too, because it can backfire and cause the entire room to scream SILENCE! all at once. 

“I want everyone to know that I’m not a girl!” She cheers, looking perhaps a bit nervous. “Or, well, I guess I never was one. Call me Sterling, alright? My entire family already does!”

Harry feels something akin to a familial bond in the room, something he’s felt for so few people before, when they all cheer and call him Sterling. It’s sort of the perfect moment for him and for everyone else, too. A perfect coming out story. 

Sterling takes another shot of firewhiskey and _whoops!_ in happiness. In pure, unadulterated joy. 

Someone turns on the music just then and it’s somehow[ Britney Spears!](https://youtu.be/LOZuxwVk7TU) Sterling gets lost in the crowd as the song continues and people pat him on the back in congratulations. 

Draco lights the fuck up at the song choice and Harry drags him up towards the center of the room when people start to dance. The lights are dimmed and someone must cast a _Muffliato_ on the room to silence the music or McGonagall would have surely been back already, so Harry lifts his arms and, already breathless, dances with Draco in the circle of his arms as they sing lyrics into the already loud room. 

He’s winded almost immediately, gasping as he tries to stay upright, but he laughs despite himself. Free. He feels fucking free. 

Harry doesn’t know where the music is coming from or who is picking the songs, but the next one that plays is a Weird Sisters song. One he’s particularly fond of that starts off slow and a little eerie and picks up the pace just enough for it to be almost entrancing. 

Draco looks so beautiful that Harry leans in just enough to show that if he’s okay with it, so is Harry. Harry’s the one who has been drinking, albeit not much, but the choice is up to Draco. He’s the one most affected by the stigma, the rumours of treachery and backstabbing. 

Draco grins up at him, cheekbones sharp and angled in the dim light, and leans down to kiss him hard enough that Harry gasps, grasping onto his robes to maintain closeness. 

Draco draws him in even closer and moves his mouth close to Harry’s ear. Harry can sense his cruel and beautiful smirk even without seeing it. 

“Be my boyfriend, Potter,” he whispers. “I’ll make it worth your while.” 

Harry grins back, laughing harshly into Draco’s ear. 

“You already have.” And then he draws back in to kiss him again. 

* * *

Harry gets a little more drunk than he should’ve, circumstances being what they are. He’s not concerned, because he’s drunk at the moment, but surely he will be tomorrow. Instead, he’s flying high and dancing with anyone who will dance with him. Particularly Draco, but he does dance for a bit with Ron after Draco heads up to bed until Harry ruins everything. 

Ron’s sort of bobbing to the beat in place of dancing, so Harry tries to engage him. Notices the glint of the silver band on Hermione’s finger from across the way and physically can't stop himself. Is just drunk enough to have no control over his mouth, no filter. 

“Are you marrying Hermione?” He asks bluntly, voice dry. “Maybe you should have mentioned that.” 

“I—” Panic, as clear as day. 

“Why didn’t you _tell_ me?” Harry narrows his eyes, suddenly remembering he has a reason to be mad. “You stopped hanging out with me, the both of you, and then you go to _Australia_ without me, and _now_ you’re getting married without mentioning it at all to me either? Are we even friends at all, Ron? And if we aren't, what was that? All those years? A joke? _Pity?”_

“Harry,” he’s so caught off guard that he doesn’t even know what to say, “I just asked her—” 

“And then never brought it up to the one person who has always been your best friend and hers? Neither of you?” Harry shakes his head, night ruined, disgust colouring his voice. “Whatever. I’m going to bed.” 

* * *

Lunch the next morning is a quiet and subdued affair in comparison to the previous night. Everyone is hung over or anxious and even Sterling Bones’ seemingly uncrushable optimism has been subdued by this dark night. 

Harry sits beside Hermione, who he refuses to even look at, and Draco, who he can’t stop looking at, and sips on a cup of hot chocolate. He hasn’t had any in such a long time that it fills his chest and his stomach with warmth and memory and alleviates the slight headache he’s got. He sighs, feeling content and upset, as Neville massages his forehead across from him. 

“Why did I drink so much?” He whispers, eyes slammed shut. “I never drink that much.” 

“Stress, probably,” responds Hannah Abott, who sits beside him in an equally dehydrated state. 

Draco’s hand is just sitting on the table beside Harry’s, empty and alone, and frankly it’s a little offensive. So Harry does what any logical person would do and reaches out his to thread his fingers with Draco’s. 

Draco laughs a little, chuffed, and continues to read the book in front of him. It’s a book on useful muggle plants that might come in handy in the forest. Good thing one of them gives a fuck, because Harry seemingly physically can’t care. 

He thought he’d be a nervous wreck the morning of his exam, shaking and sweating and vomiting, but he’s calm. Irreverent, even, to the importance of this day. 

Hermione’s in a similar state to Draco, bent over a book the size of an encyclopaedia and somehow simultaneously trying to get Harry’s attention with apologies and pleading words. It won’t work. Harry may be off his rocker, but he can still certainly still hold a grudge. 

McGonagall calls out for everyone’s attention, looking as regal as ever at the teacher’s table in her winter robes and a dark blue wide brimmed hat. 

“Attention students,” McGonagall announces, “all 8th year students must proceed out to the forest’s edge at this time. All other students are to head to their next class as scheduled.” 

She promptly exits, along with the other professors, leaving the 8th years to follow them out. 

The 7th years are abuzz with excitement, because they aren’t the ones being trapped in the forest. But, again, Harry’s not worried. He’s fine. Is just glad he brought his coat to breakfast.

Harry and his fellow eighth years rise, solemn and together, and take the long walk out to the edge of the grounds where McGonagall waits with her fellow staff members. 

“Today we’re here to finish something you all started almost a decade ago. Something you put so much time and effort into that you didn’t even let a war stop you from completing it. It’s quite incredible to witness your final moments and I want to say how proud I am of all of you for making it this far. I know this is going to be very difficult, that you may struggle with it, but just know you’ve all done harder things. I have faith that you will all come through this with passing marks.” 

McGonagall’s eyes linger on him and then move on. He smiles tragically at the look on her face. 

“And with that,” the headmistress says, “let’s begin.” 

There’s a fence, of sorts, posted around the entirety of the Forbidden Forest. It’s made entirely of a kind of warding magic that glows and sparks red hot in the air. To lock them and the dark creatures in, to keep fellow students out. 

Draco is at his side, face unreadable, tucked up tightly in his winter robes. They share a look, one full of anxiety and unrest, and then they step up towards the magical fence. 

“Good luck,” says the headmistress, “and please remember that we are all watching in case you need help. Red sparks for emergencies.” 

Harry reaches for Draco’s hand and together they step forward and cross the magical barrier that seals them in. Behind it, the woods come alive with noises of wildlife. The sun is high in the sky, but the forest is dark and cold despite the April weather. 

Harry removes his wand from his pocket and casts _Rechauff_ on him and Draco. 

“So, what should we do first?” Harry asks lightly, staring into the writhing darkness of the forest. “Make camp, I suppose. You’ve got the bag?” 

Harry has a knapsack thrown over his left shoulder full of their allowed supplies from McGonagall. Their potions, some ingredients and herbs, food, two bezoars, spare clothes, and a tent. Measly items for such a long and exhausting weekend. 

“Let’s find a safe place.” 

And so they start their hike. Hand in hand, guiding each other into the webbed darkness, they begin their ascent. 

The woods smell like wet grass and fresh dirt and rain, which is usually a peaceful sort of smell, but Harry flashes back. He feels disjointed, like he doesn’t belong here, and off kilter. He starts to sweat despite the cool April temperature and his breath comes out in frantic puffs as they walk across fallen trees and beds of glowing magical moss. 

But he keeps on going. He can stop when they find a clearing and then he can have a breakdown. He has to keep going. 

They hike until the sun starts to slip from the sky and the cold really starts to set in. Luckily, the _Rechauff_ keeps their body heat in, but Harry’s still anxiety-sweating. He really needs a fucking drink or something. God. 

Finally, they reach a clearing. Mostly, the spot is free of toppled over trees and the magical grass Harry’s sure produces poison pollen or something equally as malevolent, so they decided to settle down there. Draco pitches the tent with a spell— _carpa_ , with a rolled R sound like used when speaking Spanish—and it springs up. It’s a simple thing, just big enough for the two of them, but it’s better than nothing. 

“I’ll set up some wards, alright?” Draco says softly, looking a little worried. “You should go inside. Have a drink of water, yeah?” 

Harry must nod or say yes or something, because he finds himself inside, seated on the ground with a bottle of water in his hand. Strange. 

He can see the sparks from Draco’s spells through the exterior of the tent and he watches, silent and afraid, until Draco rejoins him inside the tent. 

“Are you alright? You look…” 

“I don’t know. I was fine until we crossed that border...and then I started to feel really uneasy. Sickly, almost.” 

“I brought you something. Maybe it’ll help?” Draco reaches into the bag and pulls out a small glass jar. 

Inside are some spotted pinkish-green leaves that Harry recognizes from that night all that time ago on the Malfoys’ balcony. Alihotsy _._

“Isn’t that against the rules?” Harry asks. 

“No. It’s a potions ingredient with calming qualities if used correctly.” Draco’s grin is beautifully wicked. “My mum taught me how to hex it.” 

And so Draco does. The leaves begin to change colour, drying up slightly until their colours are muted. Then he pulls out pieces of old parchment that he also casts a few spells on until its consistency changes, too. 

Draco has some difficulty with the next part, so Harry helps him roll a few Hotsy joints in the freshly hexed parchment. Then they light one with their wands and smoke it. 

It helps calm the fire raging in Harry’s chest and brings his body temp down to normal, at least. He feels better, for the most part, and is a little embarrassed about his behaviour. 

“Sorry about before.” 

“About what? Being nervous?” 

“Yeah, I guess. I was freaking out.” 

“Honestly, I’d thought it would be worse,” Draco says, not looking Harry in the eye. “I thought the minute you walked in here, you’d flashback. That you’d get lost in the memory of the war and have to be magically evacuated.” 

“I’m sure this is only the beginning for both of us,” is all Harry can bring himself to say, wrapping an arm around Draco's waist and burying his face in his neck. “It’s going to be a long weekend.” 

* * *

Harry’s anxiety lessens more, but still he doesn’t sleep. Draco dozes off after a while, wrapped up in his sleeping bag, and tosses frequently, obviously not entirely calmed by the hotsy. 

Harry stands guard, wand in hand, prepared to do anything to protect them, but nothing comes. Nothing but the eerie sounds of rain falling in the forest around them. He can hear creatures roaming the woods, too, but they’re far off. 

Harry casts _Lheure,_ a time-telling spell with a clockwise circular motion like a clock arm ticking, when he begins to feel like the night will never end, and realizes it’s almost 3. The witching hour, as the stories go. He imagines it will be the worst time in the forest. The most brutal. The darkest. 

He takes another drink of water from his thermos and prepares himself. Readies his wand as the forest comes alive. He hears the thump of paws and hooves in the distance like he had before, but he’s more aware now. Exhausted, but awake. 

A shadow crosses in front of the tent, passing over Harry’s stoic face quickly before it’s gone again. His heart pounds in his chest, but he’s prepared. He can do this. 

Something within a kilometre or so howls loudly, disrupting Draco in his fitful sleep, and making Harry jump. He doesn’t hear any rustling nearby, though, but the creature could just be lurking or light footed. He decides to go have a look around, just to be sure. 

“Draco,” he whispers, “are you up?” 

“Yeah, yeah.” 

“Stay here, alright? I have to have a look around.” 

_“What?”_ Draco sits upright, gripping his sleeping bag to his chest like a damsel in distress. “Absolutely not!” 

“There’s something nearby. I’m gonna try and scare it away.” 

“How exactly do you plan on doing that? With your natural power of aversion?” 

“I was gonna try and cast a patronus, dipshit.” 

“Can you even do that?” Draco looks skeptical. “After the war and everything?” 

“I haven’t tried, but I figured this might be as good a time as any.” 

“Can’t you cast it from here?” 

“I...I could try, I guess.” 

Harry had wanted the process of what may well be his failure at producing a patronus to be a secret. He didn’t want Draco to see him try and fail at yet another thing. 

But he can’t avoid it now, can he? Draco will just traipse after him out into the forest, putting the both of them in even more danger than they already are. 

So Harry shrugs his shoulders, heaves out a heavy breath, and casts the circular spell. 

_“Expecto patronum!”_ He says forcefully. 

He just hopes maggots don’t come out of the end of his wand to devour him like they did to Raczidian. 

Instead of fly larvae, though, mist flows out. Indistinct and almost nonexistent. He tries again. Nothing.

He sighs feebly, slouching down against the ground. 

“I can’t do it.” 

“How...How did you do it before?” 

“Honestly, it’s a little shallow now that I think about it, but I thought about passing my OWLs.” 

“Well, think about passing this test. About coming out of the forest unscathed and once again being the talk of the town.” 

“I don’t want to be the talk of the town. I just want a quiet life. A simple existence.” 

“Then think about that.” 

Harry sits back up, willing to give it one more chance, and focuses with all his energy on what his life will be like after he graduates.

He thinks of a small apartment in a city far from here, Quebec maybe, or maybe somewhere warm like Barcelona. He thinks of the small, one-bedroom flat he’d share with his boyfriend. Of the odd jobs he’d do to supplement his income, magical and muggle alike. Maybe he’d come back here in a couple decades when he can bear the memories of the place and teach. Maybe he’ll get married. He’ll wear a dark coloured suit, fitted to his body, and Draco will wear emerald green. When they kiss, Harry will say something snarky like “Can’t call me Potter now, can you?” or vise-versa. They’ll both get the help they need. Everything will turn out alright.

White smoke pours out from the tip of his wand like fog. It’s so bright it burns his eyes and he winces. Maybe his patronus is noncorporeal now, because it seems to fill the tent with light and smoke for a moment, so bright it’s impossible to see any darkness whatsoever. 

Draco gasps, shooting backwards across the ground in shock, and stares wide-eyed at a creature made of white rippling light like the flames in a fire. 

When Harry sees the way the light reflects in Draco’s eyes, he finally identifies the creature, small now in stature, but once so big it filled the room. 

The dragon from the _Fiendfyre_ all that time ago. It is small, not quite as small as the miniature dragons from the Triwizard Tournament, but still formidable. 

It looks down upon them, flying at half or even less than its original size, and Harry has to fight back the urge to run. This is his patronus now, for better or for worse, and he tells it what to do. It means neither him nor Draco no harm, even if the memory of the heat from the _Fiendfyre_ that killed Crabbe still burns hot against his skin. 

“There’s something in the woods,” Harry cries out, in shock of its nature and presence, “something that’s coming for us.” 

That’s all he has to say before the flaming dragon flies its small, lithe body out of the cramped space of the tent and disappears. Its bright glow fades slowly and then all at once as it roams the woods. 

“What the _fuck_ was that?” Is all Draco can manage. “You can cast a fucking _Dragon patronus?!”_

“It used to be a deer.” Harry wonders what specifically caused the change. 

He also wonders if normal wizards have the capability of producing magical patronuses. Are there wizards out there who can make nundos and griffins? Dumbledore could produce a phoenix, but could he be considered normal? 

Do normal people leave children in the care of abusive guardians? Set them up the die alone? 

So, no, Harry supposes normal people don’t have magical creatures as patronuses. This is just another thing to further separate him from the rest of the world. 

“I thought it was regular animals only,” Draco says, confused. “How the fuck did you manage that?” 

“Dumbeldore’s was a phoenix.”

“Fucking hell, Harry.” Draco shakes his head. “You’re unbelievable. Truly.” 

After a while, Harry’s patronus returns. Its fiery white glow is easily spotted as it soars through the forest, even through the thick canvas of their tent. If it is returning, that means it didn’t find anything too dangerous. 

“You should sleep now,” Draco says. “Long day tomorrow.” 

Tomorrow, they’ll start their hike. Well, in a couple hours at the break of dawn, at least. Harry removes his potion from the sack, taking a deep breath. 

The first day will be the hardest, right? 

And he takes a drink of the vial, about half of the entire potion, and closes his eyes, feeling at peace even for the few brief moments it will last. He slips down into his sleeping bag and reaches out for Draco’s hand before he lays his head down and tries to sleep. 

* * *

What feels like moments later, he wakes. Draco’s calling his name softly, almost singing it. It’s a nice thing to wake up to, so Harry smiles, rolls over to look at him. The sun has risen a bit, but the forest is still almost entirely dark. Perhaps with the thick vegetation and trees, it will always be this dark, this damp. 

Draco sits back against the tent, eyes wide, mouth squeezed shut. He looks terrified and confused. 

“What’s up?” Harry asks softly, gently. 

He brought his toothbrush and will be fully prepared to kiss Draco once he does manage to brush his teeth. He’ll probably have to use _Augamenti_ this time, though, because their filtered water is a more valuable resource. 

Harry’s looking right at Draco when the voice calls out again, from somewhere behind Harry. Singing softly, delicately, Draco says, “Harry, wake up. It’s time to wake up,” without moving his mouth at all. 

Harry bolts upright, tossing all of their shit into the bottomless knapsack as Draco does the same, and decides he can wait to brush his teeth. Whatever creature that has the ability to so successfully mimic Draco’s voice is obviously a hunter and _they_ are its prey. 

They scramble out of the tent and Harry quickly collapses the tent with the counterspell to the one that opens it up. It takes a few seconds, though, for Draco to shove the unpitched tent into the endless knapsack and that’s when Harry seems to see it. 

A huge, looming figure that crushes the ground beneath its hooves. Like a moose, but with antlers as gnarled and crisscrossed as tree branches. 

“It’s a leucrotta! Hurry, Draco!” 

Finally, Draco pulls the bag shut and they run in the opposite direction of the leucrotta, stumbling into the darkness regardless of any other dangers that are surely lurking behind the trees. They send birds scattering, scare weird salamander/snake hybrids up trees, cut off packs of small, golden yellow squirrels with five eyes on each side of their faces, but they don’t stop to look or admire or anything. 

After what feels like forever, but is probably a kilometre or so, they slow. Harry pulls out his wand to cast the mapping spell and finds they’ve gone in a diagonal to the way they had planned, running deeper into the forest than they needed to. 

The sun, which Harry can see somewhat now in the sparsity of the trees in this part of the forest, is high in the sky. Almost noon, perhaps. He checks the time to be sure, though, with _Lhuere,_ and finds it’s 10:59. 

“Let’s stop. Look for some lunch.” 

They haven’t eaten since lunch yesterday and neither of them were in good shape to begin with. They have some emergency supplies, but they both agree they should save those in case of emergency. So they start their exhausted walk. 

Harry’s been so busy, so anxious, so worried, that he hadn’t thought about food. That happens to him a lot now, being too sick with life to eat, but today his stomach is cramping in hunger, so he knows something has changed. 

Draco says he’ll pitch camp and then take a shower after and sends Harry off to look for food. Harry wonders if showering with an _Aguamenti_ will really work as he picks through the plants that encover the forest floor. 

After a while, he finds an apple tree. Divine. He gathers some of them in his arms, surprised at their ripeness and the diversity of colour despite the time of year, and heads back to camp. Draco’s sitting on a tree stump beside a glowing fire with his robes draped over his shoulders. 

“Found some apples.” 

“Apples?” Draco sounds confused. “In April?”

“Maybe the Ministry put it there so we wouldn’t starve in here. Sustained it with magic somehow.” 

“Maybe,” Draco says agreeably. “Toss me one?” 

Harry lobs a firm, green apple towards Draco and takes a seat beside the fire. His _Rechauff_ is beginning to wear off and his fingers are cold. 

“Funny,” Draco says softly, to himself. “These must be magical.” 

“Why do you say that?” Harry takes a bite. Tastes fine to him. 

“Run your finger down the side. It sparks.” 

Harry finds himself sharing sparks with a lemon-yellow apple. The sparks are small and bright purple and probably harmless. Are probably just a side effect of the magic used to keep the tree and fruit safe in the cold April air. 

“I’ve seen these before,” Draco says again as Harry takes another bite. “In a book, I think.” 

“That’s because they’re _apples,_ Draco. They’re in _every_ book.”

The taste is delicious. Sharp and fragrant, almost like a Granny Smith, but bright yellow in colour. He takes another bite. 

“Potter, wait.” Draco’s eyebrow is still furrowed. “Wait a second. Stop eating.” 

Harry’s already got another mouthful of apple, but he swallows it anyway. It’s _just_ an apple.

“These are _epli!”_ Draco smacks the apples from Harry’s arms. “I read about them in one of my father’s books!” 

“What do they do?” Harry’s not sure if it’s the drama of the whole thing, but his stomach begins to turn. 

Draco’s father’s books were probably all Dark, so whatever the apples do, it cannot possibly be good. 

“Fuck I can’t remember the exact details, but they’re poison!” Draco rummages through the backpack frantically as Harry’s head starts to spin. 

“Poison?” He asks faintly. 

And then he wretches, coating his shoes in sticky gold vomit. The dead leaves on the ground start to smoke, catch flame, and then burn. 

Harry’s head feels as light as air and his tongue is a cement paperweight. When he slips from the log he’s been sitting on and crashes to the ground, he finds he can’t pick himself back up. His eyes are open and he stares up at the relentless sun through a gap in the trees. It’s beautiful like this, even when it’s burning holes in his corneas, but the moment is ruined by Draco’s shadow. He blinks once, amazed at the amount of effort the usually effortless motion takes, and Draco pries open his mouth. His cement tongue is heavy and useless as he shoves something small and tasteless into his mouth and slams it shut. The rock-like object tumbles down his throat and he, with all the strength he has left, swallows it. 

* * *

Harry wakes up in the tent, throat dry, mouth drier, with his eyes blinking to rid himself of the sparks in his vision. Whatever those apples were, they were fucking bad. Obviously. 

“Draco?” He calls out. 

No answer. He sits up, feeling fine despite poisoning himself, and casts a _Lheure_ to see the time. Only an hour has gone by, so what could Draco be doing? 

He calls out again and the forest, despite its usual howls and calls, is quiet. He takes a drink of the water to soothe his throat and then rises, exiting the tent. 

Draco must have tucked him away while he went off to look for something...or maybe he was attacked while Harry was out and had to be magically evacuated! Or maybe he’s injured and lying in a ditch while the leucrotta circles him and waits to end his life. 

Harry springs into action; He has to find Draco! 

There’s a new sound in the distance. It’s almost like a weeping woman, shrieking in loss or grief or pain. Obviously not Draco, but still, who or what could it be? It sounds so haunting it chills him to his bones. 

“Draco!” Harry whispers into the forest, hoping he’s near enough to hear. “Draco!” 

“Potter,” Draco says, stepping into his line of sight, hands full of something, “why in God’s name are you shouting?” 

“I was looking for you, you twat! Where were you?” 

“Looking for actually edible food,” he says haughtily, rolling his eyes. “Not that you’d know what that looks like.” 

Harry narrows his eyes and presses his lips together firmly. Arsehole. 

“We should get going,” Harry says instead of something he might regret. “Got a lot of land to cover before noon tomorrow.” 

Just under a day left and Harry’s already poisoned himself with his own stupidity. Maybe he’s the arsehole. 

“Alright,” Draco says lightly. “Eat this. It’s a plangentine. Like a clementine, sort of, but they’re sharper and can cause uncontrollable levitation if not eaten correctly.” 

“What was that noise? The crying?” 

“The tree…” He grows quiet, solemn. “It weeps when you take its fruit.” 

Harry looks down to try and understand that. These plangentine trees cry for their young when they’re taken, weep in grief, are capable of understanding the implications of the fruit’s disappearance. Harry immediately knows he can’t eat those. He won’t. 

“The tree has empathy? It grieves?” 

“I don’t think so, no. Professor Sprout said it’s just a reaction.” 

“But its cries…they’re so realistic, so painful.” 

“Grieving sounds. But they’re just magic in the tree itself, Harry. It’s not actually missing its fruit.” 

Harry sighs, but he can’t agree. 

He can still hear the tree’s desperate cries, its grief at knowing its children will be eaten mercilessly. He feels sick, like if he had anything besides a bezoar and the remnants of the poison _epli_ in his stomach, he’d vomit it up. 

Draco eats a plangentine in the quiet of the forest as they trek their way back to their camp. Harry has nothing to say that Draco will be willing to hear, so it’s better he keeps quiet. Perhaps they’ll stumble back upon the weeping branches of the plangentine tree and Harry can return at least one of the tree's fruits. Maybe then his stomach will relent its tumultuous tumbles.

When they return, it’s clear something has gone awry. Their fire has been stomped out, their belongings strewn about, and their tent is tattered and torn into pieces. Harry himself cannot bear the sight and collapses to his knees on the outskirts as Draco continues on, kicking at the hot coals of their dying fire to put it out so it doesn’t burn the forest to the ground.

This is punishment for the fruit. Harry’s sure something has come to seek revenge for tearing apart that tree and its fruit. Perhaps using the pronoun “its” in reference to the tree is insulting to her, who has enough wherewithal to know when her children are gone, so Harry changes his stance. 

That tree may be a tree, but she is also a creature. A mother looking for her young who have been so callously snatched from their beds. 

“We have to return the rest of the fruit, Draco.” 

“What?” He turns in the rubble. “No, no. It’s not about that. It’s got to be that leucrotta that finally hunted us down, looking for scraps and whatnot.” 

“No, no. She was looking for vengeance. _Justice_ for the loss of her children.”

“That’s crazy. It’s just a tree, Potter!” 

Harry can’t believe this. The tree is still crying off in the distance, still in pain while Draco eats her children right in front of Harry. Harry gags and wretches, bringing up only bile. The bezoar must have digested already and with it, the poison apples, so this is all he has in his stomach. He feels like weeping for the tree, for its loss, but does something else. He stands on shaky feet and casts _Petrificus Totalus_ before Draco can do anything about it at all. 

It’s done so quickly that Draco doesn’t even have time to react, no time to evade. He freezes up, frozen totally, and all the fruits fall from his arms. 

Harry casts _Levicorpus_ to lift Draco up, because leaving him here is dangerous enough when he _isn’t_ petrified, let alone now, and gathers the fruit and the surviving supplies in his backpack. Thankfully it has survived the attack and, with it, their potions and ingredients. 

Harry meets Draco’s peeved eyes and sighs. 

“Sorry, but you were being a twat.” And with that, he starts his hike towards the crying tree, towing Draco’s stunned body in the air behind him. 

* * *

The tree is towering and beautiful and the fruit glisten on the branches in the late afternoon sun. It would be an incredible sight if the tree wasn’t screaming at the top of her lungs. 

“Hello,” Harry says calmly, “my name’s Harry. My friend, he, well, he took something that belongs to you and we’re here to make it right, okay? Or try to, at least.” 

Harry uses _Liberacorpus_ to lower Draco to the ground so he can focus in totality on the tree in front of him. 

“Can you speak?” The tree gives no sign other than the constant, unintelligible sobbing. “That’s alright, love. I’m going to try and fix your branches, okay?” 

Harry digs in the bag and removes the half dozen fruits. At the sight or perhaps the sense, the tree’s wailing increases tenfold. Harry has to remind himself why he’s there because the cry is so all consuming he can’t think. 

The branches dangle a foot or so overhead and it’s easy to see where Draco made haste picking off the fruit, so Harry holds up one and places it back against the branch. With his other hand, he casts _Episkey_ , hoping against all hope that it will work. It doesn’t, though, so he has to think up another strategy and quickly. He doesn’t know how long Draco will be down for or if the weeping will bring on predators. 

He presses the fruit, neon orange and slightly oval in shape, against the branch and thinks about something Professor Sprout said once. He remembers nothing about the tree itself, but of another where she cut off one branch and attached it magically back to a different one. As the days went by, the new tree grew two different types of fruit on its branches. But what was the spell she used? _Kupandiza?_ Fuck. What was it? _Kupandi?_

Draco’s body lays on the ground a few feet away, useless, as Harry stands underneath the tree’s branches, mobile but also entirely useless as well. 

He thinks and he thinks and he thinks. 

The motion he’s almost sure is an x where the bottom meets and crosses over. ૪ He practices it with his wand, hoping it will give him an idea and then it does! It comes from a Swahili word!

 _“Kupandikiza!_ ” He says proudly, casting his crossed X and removing his hand. 

The fruit hangs back where it belongs. Harry’s so relieved he could cry. He quickly does the rest of the fruit that he has left and looks forlornly at the open space next to the trunk. The final fruit, the last to stop the wails, is in Draco’s stomach. Unretreivable. 

“That is all I have, love. I’m so sorry for your loss. I hope...I hope you can forgive us this mistake, but I know how a guilt like that can eat you up inside. I know because I feel it, too. I have done my best to return your children to their homes and I...I…” He fails to find the words. “I’m so terribly sorry.” 

The trees weeping has diminished somewhat, enough that Harry can think again, but grief fills them both. At another loss, with more blood on Harry’s already blood soaked hands. 

After doing all he can, he turns from the tree and uses _Finite_ to free Draco from his prison. The look on his face says it all and Harry cannot possibly bear this conversation, so he turns and uses his wand to find the correct direction before heading off. Draco follows behind him, as quiet as a church mouse, as the plangentine tree weeps over the senseless murder of her child, over the kidnapping of her children. 

When Harry escapes this hellish forest, he plans on writing a long letter to Newt Scammander advising him to look into the lives of plangentine trees and see if they are really trees or actual beings. 

* * *

They keep walking until it’s beyond good sense, because the forest is pitch black. Harry can see nothing outside of the sphere of light from the _Lumos_ on his wand tip. Draco says nothing, almost like Harry has stuck his tongue to the roof of his mouth with a _Langlock,_ and walks along. 

Eventually, Harry is too tired to go on. His stomach, which is usually easily ignored, grumbles ferociously and he needs to rest. 

They only have half a day or so left in the forest, so Harry takes out some of the emergency food and lays it out. He also lays out their sleeping bags and lights a fire, because Draco sits some distance away and does nothing to move or help in any way. 

Harry’s still sick to his stomach that Draco could take the fruit while the tree wailed so incredibly, but he has to eat, so he does. He eats a strip of beef that’s way too salty for him and then a pack of water biscuits that he spreads with cheese. He saves Draco half of his meager meal and drinks an entire container of water. 

He can still hear the Pplangentine’s cries, even from this distance, and knows he will not sleep much tonight. 

“Eat,” Harry says flatly, standing up to walk the food over to Draco. 

He returns to his spot on his sleeping bag, staring up the thick overhang of tree branches as the screams stop all together. His ears are ringing from the wails, so it takes him a moment to notice, but by the time he does, he can hear a new sound. 

[ Singing. ](https://youtu.be/4Uxtf8d7D-c)

_“Bíum bíum bambaló, / Bambaló og dillidillidó / Vini mínum vagga ég í ró / En úti biður andlit á glugga,”_ the voice sings. 

It’s the eeriest thing Harry’s ever heard. It’s certainly not English, so he can’t understand the words, but he gets the feeling. The intention. Something is watching them. 

Perhaps it is the influence of the tree keeping watch over them or another of the forest’s malevolent creatures, but the song still fills the entire woods. It’s all around Harry, filling in empty spaces of white noise with its destitute words. 

He feels so suddenly out of place, out of this world, that it exhausts him. The song carries on and he feels more forlorn, even homesick. But for which home? 

The Weasleys’ burrow? For the few sweet months he spent with his parents in Godric’s Hollow as a newborn? God forbid it, but is he _actually_ pining for the cupboard under the fucking stairs? 

He gives his head a strong shake and casts the quieting charm, _Shhhhh!,_ with a harsh downward flick of his wand. The forest sounds continue, but the singing dulls enough so Harry can think again. The song continues on, though it’s much quieter, it is equally as eerie as before. 

What _is_ that? 

Harry turns towards Draco to ask and is shocked to see him rocking back and forth with his hands covering his ears. He’s mumbling to himself, eyes slammed shut, as he rocks almost in tune with the words of the song, tears streaming down his face. 

_“Hjá mér bæði hlíf og skjól hafa skaltu' ef illskufól flærðir með um foldarból læðast og launráð brugga.”_

“Draco,” Harry says, kneeling beside him. “What’s wrong?” 

Draco is unresponsive and absolutely shaking like a leaf. Whatever this song is, it’s scaring him nearly to death. 

Harry grabs his forearms, starting to get scared himself, as the trees seem to open up. A creature steps through. 

Tall and skeletal, draped in a ragged black cloak, a _dementor_ stands not 10 yards from Harry and Draco, sucking all the life out of them with just its presence. 

Harry stumbles to his feet, bumping hard into Draco and falling to his arse. From there, he scuttles back on hand and knee, terrified at what he knows is coming. 

The Ministry have finally done it. They’ve finally gotten Harry Potter the way they’ve wanted him all along: 

Dead. 

He starts to shriek as the being draws nearer and voices fill his ears as the lullaby swells. Voices of the dead and the dying and the suffering scream and beg and plead. 

His mum, his dad, Sirius, Remus, Tonks, Fred, Hermione. He can smell burnt flesh, can feel the heat and finality of the killing curse that he endured twice, Bellatrix's knife in the skin of his forearm, of claws digging into the skin of his face, of his ear being sliced from his head, and drowns under the weight of it all. It’s just too much. Too much death, too much pain, too much malignancy. 

He sobs and screams and writhes in the agony as the creature stands above him almost, within a metre, and its face is shadowed in darkness. Its nearness to the fire puts it out, blinding Harry to the creature’s true terrifying mask. 

Draco says nothing as the lullaby finally ends, still in his own world. 

_“Bíum, bíum, bambaló.”_

Suddenly, Harry feels it. Feels the draw of the dementor’s kiss, feels the ripping of his soul from his body, and he is physically unable to stop it. 

“Draco!” He screams, pleading even though he can no longer see him. “Fucking run!” 

Harry has only a moment to wonder if the professors are flying to save him before he knows they won’t make it. How could they? Harry is dying in real time and they are so far away. 

“Draco!” He says once more. “Run!”

The pain of the tragedy that is his life chokes him even more than the kiss itself. He is dying, for real this time, and he is unable to stop it. 

His eyes start to shut as tears slip down his dampened cheeks. He feels so cold, so empty. So lonely. As his eyes slide shut, he can see the bright light of death and can feel the warm light of the afterlife on his cheek. 

He doesn’t even have anything left to hope that he ends up in heaven and not hell, like he knows he truly deserves.


	6. resurrection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the final one! glad we made it this far! hope you've enjoyed the journey :)
> 
> cw: sexual content

Draco’s never done this before. 

He’s never been this terrified before either, which he supposes really says something about his state of mind in here. This forest has a way of warping reality when there aren’t extra magical creatures hunting you down to slaughter and eat you, so it’s especially malevolent now. Especially with that goddamn music playing. 

The song, a lullaby, fills his ears and chokes him like two tight hands around his throat, like a constrictor boa wrapped around his esophagus, popping blood vessels and arteries until he’s just a suffocated carcass, a body on the ground. He can remember the sound of Voldemort singing the song to Nagini, the snake who he trusted enough to be his Horcrux, as her body constricted around Draco’s mother’s body, enough to easily kill her. 

He commanded the snake to tighten and tighten until the vessels beneath Narcissa’s skin bulged and popped, until bruises formed on her arms and abdomen and chest, until her screams shook the manor walls with agony. And then Draco relented, because what else could he do? How could he, a fearful and petulant child, ever evade the Dark Lord?

The song pervades his nightmares as the memories flash up, back from the place he’d locked them away. He sees Voldemort’s hand wrapped tight around the hilt of Lucius’ wand as it pressed Dark Magic into the skin of Draco’s forearm, dark-marking him as tainted forever more. The moment he was Marked will haunt him like nothing else. The pain, the disconnect, the smell, all trivial in comparison to the real truth. The knowledge and implications of what it meant to wear this tattoo burned him as much as the _Fiendfyre_ would burn Crabbe alive two years later. 

The lullaby continues, eerie and nauseating, until Draco is incomprehensibly lost. He shakes and rocks himself on the forest floor, whimpering in instinctual fear. 

The song is about someone lurking in the window, watching through the glass. It’s about slaughtering animals to feast upon, about the perils of surviving a lonely and frozen Icelandic winter. 

Something slams into Draco’s quivering form and knocks the wind out of his chest. The song is so loud, even though Draco is sure Potter cast a _Shhh!_ on the woods, that he can’t think, can't see, can't breathe. All he can hear are the lyrics, twisted so darkly in the Dark Lord’s mouth as he sang, as Nagini curled languidly around his torso and shoulders and down his arm.

_“Bíum, bíum, bambaló.”_

When Draco manages to open his eyes to see the source of the song and of his paralyzing fear, the fire’s almost gone out. Burnt down to smoulders and ash in the presence of the dark creature. A dementor. 

He cries out at the sight of a black silhouette standing over Harry, skeleton hands outstretched towards him, as Harry screams for Draco to run with his final breath of air. The fire burns out and Draco thinks of Crabbe who perished in the _Fiendfyre_ almost a year ago and then he thinks of the chimeras and fire creatures that rose from the flames to consume them. Harry could have left Draco there to burn, could have run off, but he didn’t. He stayed to help and risked his stupid life to save Draco's ungrateful and worthless arse. 

Draco, no matter his fear and pain, has to do the same. The Golden Boy deserves better than dying in the Forbidden Forest after escaping its clutches so many times before.

Draco summons all the courage he can find in his weak body and then shakily rises to his feet in the pitch darkness. He removes his wand from his pocket and tries to think of something. Something that makes him happy. Makes him whole. Makes the world keep on going. 

_“Expecto Patronum!”_ He casts in a moment of blind fucking panic, because Harry has to be alright. 

He has to! He didn’t come this far to die on the verge of graduating, on moving on with his wretchedly tortured existence, and Draco will be damned if he plays another part in the death of Harry Potter. 

Draco will be the saviour this time. He'll finally do some good to start evening out the evil he's done in his short existence. In just 19 years, he's done so much bad, but making up for it begins here. Begins with saving the saviour's life. 

Light white smoke pours from his wand like a cotton ball or candy floss. He’s never felt so brave, thinking of Harry’s face and of all their friends’ cheers when they survive this hell, and it shows when he manages to successfully cast a patronus for the first time ever. 

The puff solidifies into a creature, which is something he hadn’t expected, and the animal rears back with pointed wings, charging head on into the darkness. As it nears Harry and the dementor, its light brightens the scene. Skeleton fingers press in Harry’s gaunt cheeks as the dark creature sucks the life out of the boy Draco so desperately loves and he cries out as his brave little Patronus, a sparrow of all things, flies straight into the heart of the dementor. The goodness and purity of the tiny little bird burns bright inside the dementor’s chest, blinding Draco as Harry drops to the ground, and the soul-sucking being and the patronus burst into a blinding flash of light and disappear. Evaporate. 

Draco drops to his knees in front of Harry and casts a _Lumos_ to see the damage, to see if his boyfriend is still alive. 

There are tears in his eyes as he reaches for him, squeezing his shoulders so tightly it should hurt him enough to squeal, but he doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t move in any way. 

Draco sobs as Harry’s limp body slinks down on the cold ground and he sends up red signal sparks into the sky. Why haven’t any fucking professors come to their aid? What the fuck is going through their minds? Do they seriously think this situation is under fucking control? 

“God damn it!” He cries out. 

Haven’t they seen at all what’s going on or have they been too absorbed with their stupid, petulant school-things to notice that the only person who has ever loved Draco for who he is and who he was is dead? 

Sobs wrack his chest and he crumples down, holding Harry’s body to his chest. The boy who lived has died. 

Harry Potter is dead.

* * *

Draco blacks out. He comes to with a wand poking his cheek and a calming hand on his arm. When he opens his eyes, he can see the dark, thin fingers are familiar. In fact, he’s held that hand more times than he could count. 

“Potter?” He whispers and it’s the most heart-breaking feeling not knowing if he’s hoping for something impossible or inevitable. “Is that you?” 

“You cast a patronus,” Harry says softly. “What were you thinking of?” _You._ Always you. 

“You’re alive?” He asks instead of answering. 

The small sparrow that makes up his patronus is something he’ll have to think about in private. Why such a small, defenseless little bird? Such a delicate being that relies on wings to move?

“Of course, idiot. Minnie said it was only a boggart, so it couldn’t kill me. It scared me almost to death, though.” 

“The headmistress was here?” 

“You slept through it. Poppy checked you over and said you just needed to rest...so we let you rest.” 

Draco sits up, disoriented but so fucking relieved. He throws his arms around Potter recklessly, toppling them both over, and squeezes him as tightly as he can. He's out of breath immediately, but can't be concerned with that. 

“You’re so lucky you didn’t die on me!” He says into his ear, tears in his eyes. “You’d have fucking _paid_ for that!” 

“Paid?” Harry laughs. It’s the most beautiful sound Draco has ever heard. “Didn’t I pay enough?”

“In some ways, you’ve paid too much,” Draco admits softly, “and in others, you haven’t even started. So pay up, Potter.” 

Harry pulls back to smile and kisses him. It’s a truly brilliant moment and Draco is so happy Harry’s alive. 

* * *

Harry and Draco decide it’s better to get no sleep and get the hell out of the forest than it is to spend one minute longer than they have to inside it, so they prepare for a long hike. 

The sun rises high and the monsters in the forest don’t quiet. They see a herd of dog-like creatures with ram's horns and wings, they see apparently non-extinct blast-ended skrewts setting fire to plants with their fiery arses, and a diricawl who disappears and reappears at will. Once, during fall down the side of a steep hill, they spot the glittering tail of a unicorn and Harry’s reminded of the time he and Draco found the dead one in this very forest all that time ago. 

“Do you remember…?” 

“Yes. With Fang and Hagrid and the centaur, yeah. I remember.” Draco’s voice is tight. 

And with Professor Quirrell and with Lord Voldemort. 

Harry has nothing else to say, so they keep going. They spot magical plants, too, including the so elusive Alihotsy, but they’re less exciting than the magical wildlife. Harry can’t help but stop to collect some Alihotsy for later, though, because it usually is so rare. Just in case. 

By midday, Harry’s tracking spell says there’s not much distance left to go before the Portkey, so they stop to rest. They’re both feeling alright, despite the general lack of sleep and food between them, and are excited to get the fuck out of this hellhole. 

Harry can’t wait to sit in a hot bath and then lay in his bed with Draco’s body pressed up against his own. He can’t wait for something to drink that isn’t water, for something to smoke that isn’t hotsy. 

He desperately wants a coffee with some cream. The luxuries of his existence, he supposes. 

“I can’t wait for a bath,” Harry says, “and some coffee. And a cigarette.” 

“Agreed. Shall we share the bath?” His eyes glitter. 

Harry grins and nudges Draco’s shoulder a little. Of course they’ll share the bath. Harry wouldn’t have it any other way. 

The spell points them through a thicket of what seems to be raspberry bushes, except the raspberries are baby pink and hum when Harry brushes a hand over the branches. Spooky. He’s tired and exhausted, but he fills with adrenaline when he sees the unicorn statue. Brilliant! 

He and Draco share a look before they run for it, hands just brushing the horse’s front leg when they’re finally removed from the forest. 

Harry finds himself in the Great Hall with all the students and teachers gathered around eating lunch. Draco’s at his side and, in comparison to everyone else, they’ve both filthy and gross. 

“Congratulations!” Says the headmistress, smiling resolutely at the two of them. 

The students clap loudly for them and the other 8th years cheer, because, despite the odds being against it, they actually survived in there. 

“Your final grades will be announced tomorrow morning. For now, return to your dormitory and get cleaned up. Food will be brought up to your room, so you’re fully ready for your congratulatory party tomorrow afternoon. Good job, boys, and good night.” 

Harry and Draco share a look and then look toward their friends. They’re all smiling and giving them thumbs up and don’t seem to be embarrassed that they almost got defeated by a boggart dressed in black robes singing a weird lullaby. So they turn and head upstairs, only stopping to grab a change of clothes from their room before heading down to the prefect’s bath to bathe. 

Draco’s an expert with the bathtub, so Harry lets him pick the settings. Something smelling sharp and woodsy that bubbles softly and turns the water a soft blue. Awesome. 

The less awesome part is getting naked. Harry’s never really been naked in front of anyone before, not even Ron, and his body’s so damaged now that he grows nervous, but Draco has no reservations. He strips casually and his back is so thin and boney that Harry nearly gasps. He could count every rib and vertebra beneath his skin if he had the mind to. 

His own back is probably worse, but still. 

Maybe they both need help. 

Draco is incredibly beautiful, of course, but he’s so thin. So frail. If Harry’s that bad (or, most likely, he's worse) it’s no small wonder they didn’t die out there. If they don't get Os for surviving alone, Harry's going to throw a fucking fit. 

Draco slips into the water slowly with his back turned, so Harry feels comfortable enough to take off his jacket and filthy clothes and slip under the water on his opposite side. The water is smooth and heavenly after almost 3 days of running, crying, dirt, rain, strange fruit, and sweat. Warm and smelling like Draco. 

He takes his time washing his boney body, noticing almost for the first time that he can pretty much wrap his hand around his bicep and touch his fingers together. Oh, God, that can’t possibly be good. 

He shakes his head and then jumps into the deeper end of the bath to wash his hair. It’s so long now he feels he should find a tie to put it up. But then everyone would see the lightning bolt scarred into his forehead, something he’s worked very hard to keep covered, and it would defeat the purpose. 

Either way, he has to do something about it, because it’s getting out of hand. 

When he surfaces, he finds Draco’s clean and grinning face just inches from his own. He doesn’t startle, but instead leans in to kiss him very gently on his mouth. Just because he can. 

“I love you, you know that?” Draco says softly. “Even if you’re an arsehole who keeps almost dying.” 

“As long as I don’t really die, I’m fine with that.” And that’s it, isn’t it? 

Harry doesn’t _want_ to die. He just wants the pain, the memories, the ache of his losses, to stop. He doesn’t want it to hurt anymore. 

“And I love you, too.”

* * *

The weekend in the forest seems to have softened some of his distaste for Hogwarts while further scarring him emotionally at the same time. He’s grown from the experience, yes, but he makes a mental note to tell Headmistress McGonagall that he doesn’t feel it should be an alternative offered in the following years; It’s just too dangerous for kids who didn’t die once already in a war, you know? 

Harry lays down in his bed a changed man as Draco runs to brush his teeth. This night has invigorated him and reminded him of why he liked Hogwarts to begin with. It’s an escape from all the shit and the pain and the malignancy of the real world. It was until Voldemort ruined it with his pointless war, that is, but it's with this precise thought that he makes a rash decision. 

Why should Voldemort get to determine where Harry feels at home? The answer is he shouldn’t. Voldemort is dead and gone, and despite all odds, Harry is still here. He’s still alive. 

He stands up to grab a quill, some ink, and a small sheet of parchment, where he scribbles out a quick letter. Once finished, he rushes down the owlery, ignoring Draco’s protests, and finds Pig. Pig isn’t his owl, but he takes the letter with grace, addressed to Jillian Artemeus, Hermione’s Mind Healer friend. 

_Dear Healer Artemeus,_

_I’m seeking some council due to some remaining complications from the war and Hermione Granger mentioned that you might be able to assist me. I was wondering if you’d be open to meeting me to discuss why I’m having such difficulty getting over it and how I can move on, as I’m done letting Voldemort control my life from beyond the grave._

_You can contact me via owl or find me at Hogwarts for the next few weeks._

_I impatiently await your reply,_

_Harry Potter (yes, that one)_

* * *

Harry and Draco climb back into bed after their bath and letter sending, feeling warm and clean for the first time in days. Harry climbs into his side of their tiny shared twin bed and Draco crawls into the opposite side. The sheets are cool against Harry's skin. 

“Good night,” Harry whispers after turning off the lights. “Sweet dreams and all.” 

“Night,” Draco says, but he doesn’t turn away or close his eyes. 

In the shadowy light from the moon, Harry watches him. Watches his translucent eyelashes and the shine of his grey eyes. Notices the soft smile on his lips. And can’t help himself, not when Draco’s looking at him like that and there’s nothing and no one to interrupt them. 

He leans in to kiss him, hand creeping up to the back of Draco’s neck. Draco meets him halfway, already waiting. 

It feels different this time. The pressure of Draco’s mouth isn’t enough, is amazing, but still not enough, because Harry suddenly wants more. Harry kisses him harder, wraps a leg around Draco’s thigh to pull him in close, and feels better. 

He wants Draco as close as physically possible. God. 

Draco opens his mouth and kisses Harry even harder, grasping his hands in the back of Harry’s shirt so tight it’s pulled taught around his shoulders. 

“Harry,” Draco whispers when Harry kisses down the curve of his throat to his collarbones. 

Harry kisses him again, but Draco pushes him backwards onto the pillows so he can lean up and over him. He looks so beautiful from below. 

“Hi,” he whispers and his entire face is lit perfectly by the moonlight creeping in from the window beside their bed. 

Harry grins up at him and bites his lip. He wants Draco in any way he’ll have him. Wants him for decades and days and forever. Wants his bitchy replies and somehow perfectly messy bedhead. Wants to be his mother’s favourite son and Patches’ favourite brother. Wants Pansy to like him, just so Draco knows how deeply he feels. He wants it all and more and has no possible rational way to say it. 

So he just kisses him with all the feelings he doesn’t have words for. Kisses him and holds his hips with his hands, fingers just sort of lingering underneath his shirt. Draco’s mouth is unrelenting and hot and Harry’s just so in love with him that it physically hurts. 

Draco sits back up and slips off his shirt. 

“Can I take off yours, too?” He asks and the innocence and the mischief in his eyes shouldn’t be so fucking hot, but it is. 

Harry sits up, too, and Draco slips his white t-shirt over his head, giving his still damp hair a ruffle with his fingers after with a laugh. 

“Your hair’s getting long,” Draco says with soft eyes. “It’s never been this long before. You look like a brunette Kurt Cobain.” 

Draco’s Walkman has been getting used regularly, apparently. Harry hadn’t even given him a Nirvana tape, which means Draco sought it out on his own and liked it enough to look up the lead singer. 

Leave it to Draco to find an apt comparison that shocks Harry enough to force him to laugh. 

“I need to trim it, that’s for sure.” 

“I kinda like it. Makes you look mysterious.” 

“What if I’m tired of being mysterious?” 

“Then I like it short, too. Reminds me of that boy I used to know.” 

Harry smiles, looks down at Draco’s bare chest, at the deep scars from the spell that he cast. If only he’d known what that spell did before he’d used it. If only Snape hadn’t put it in that damned book to begin with. Harry presses his hands against Draco’s shoulders, laying him down, and leans in to kiss Draco’s chest, kiss the raised scars that his anger had so rashly caused. He kisses them like it can undo all the harm, all the pain, all the scarring. Like he can erase the bad parts and keep the good. 

He can't, of course, but his intention is clear. 

Draco moans softly under his lips, hands brushing over Harry’s skin, and just enjoys it. 

“I’m sorry for these,” Harry says, “but I’m glad we’re together now.” 

“Every second of pain was worth it just to have this. Have you.” Draco’s voice shakes and Harry just has to kiss him again. 

Harry is so sad at the thought that they both had to suffer so terribly to get here. So sad and so relieved that they're both still here. 

“Let me show you how much you mean to me,” Harry says softly and, at Draco’s nod, he slips back up the bed to kiss down Draco’s chest. 

Over his ribs, across every scar, down the soft blond hair on his stomach, and to the waistband of his pajamas. He kisses across there, feeling only momentarily unsure of where to go from here, but he finds his way. 

“Please,” Draco says, looking at him with pleading eyes. “Do it.” 

Harry kisses down over his pajamas, down over the seams until he’s level with Draco’s dick. He takes a moment to look up at Draco, to make sure he’s okay, and he’s watching Harry back. He nods his head and Harry forges on. 

He slowly slips off Draco’s pajamas, leaving him in just his dark blue underpants. He presses his lips against the outline, hard already, and mouths him through the fabric. Draco moans at once, hands squeezing the duvet, and Harry continues, licking his dick until Draco’s pleading for more. 

Harry’s so hard it hurts, but he has other things to worry about when Draco looks so especially beautiful like this, eyes half-shut, mouth open, chest rising and falling rapidly. God. 

Harry slips his hands under the elastic Draco’s pants and slips them down his legs, too. Harry can’t believe the privilege he’s been given. He reaches for Draco’s dick and holds it firmly in his hand, giving him a few slow, practiced strokes. Draco moans softly, mutters Harry’s name a few times. 

_“Please.”_

Harry leans up to give Draco another kiss, unable to resist, and strokes him while their mouths clash together. Draco can barely kiss he’s such a wreck, but Harry persists. He twists his wrist a little, getting a slightly better angle for the both of them, and then Draco moans fully. Loudly. 

Harry’s never heard such an entrancing sound. Beautiful. He kisses this once more, before lowering himself back down to take Draco into his mouth. 

He’s never done this before, any of it, but he has the general idea. He sucks gently on the head of Draco’s cock, tongue working the underside. He can barely breathe, but Draco's needs come first. 

“I’m gonna...Harry, I’m going to…” He says breathlessly, but Harry doesn’t stop. 

He can’t bear it. He sucks his dick into his mouth and bobs his head, lips tight, until Draco comes. 

It’s reality shattering. Harry watches him, watches his back arch, watches his hands become fists in the blanket. Watches him cry out Harry’s name as he comes, looking so handsome and regal and beautiful it’s probably illegal. Harry is so lucky. 

He swallows. 

Draco takes a moment to recover, breathing so heavily Harry’s momentarily afraid he’s had a heart attack. Merlin, would that be a story. Rita Skeeter would have fun with that one: 

**GOLDEN BOY FINALLY KILLS DEATH BEATER:** _How Harry Potter seduced and destroyed Draco Malfoy and ended the Dark Lord’s final attempt at redemption_ _  
_By Rita Skeeter

Once he’s good again, he kisses Harry so passionately he inadvertently moans against Draco's mouth. He’s going to come so fast. Hopefully, Draco won’t take the piss out of him for it later. 

He winds his hand down and grasps Harry’s dick in his hand firmly, mouthing down his neck and chest as he strokes him softly, slowly. Barely there at all. Teasing bastard. 

He places his lips on Harry’s nipple, enveloping it in the heat of his mouth, which causes him to moan again. Draco grins and circles his tongue as he strokes Harry, which is too much and not enough at the same time. 

“Draco, please,” he whimpers, sounding a little pathetic, but so out of it. “Please.” 

“Okay, but only because you asked nicely.” Bastard. 

Draco kisses his nipple and relents, drawing down the bed to suck the head of Harry’s cock into his mouth. The pleasure is immediate and all encompassing. Harry’s so in love that he can feel the beat of his heart and the beat of Draco’s—in sync. Draco hollows his cheeks, looking elegant and regal even with a dick in his mouth, and Harry gasps. 

“Draco,” he whispers, unable to shut the fuck up. “Oh, my God.” 

Draco bobs his head, still stroking the base of Harry’s dick, tongue running circles on the head, and Harry warns him. He’s so so so so so so close. 

Draco shakes his head, determined as Harry was, and then he takes Harry’s entire dick into his mouth. Or as much as he can fit. The heat and the pressure is so much it’s enough, finally. Harry is literally going to die. 

Then he bobs his head and Harry dies. He comes in Draco’s mouth, with a handful of Draco’s silver white hair, his mouth open and legs shaking. 

“Oh, my God,” he says. “Oh, my God.”

* * *

The next morning, someone raps their knuckles on the door for a full, stubborn 10 minutes before Harry has the energy to remove himself from his bed. Draco sleeps on peacefully, undisturbed by the darkness tonight, briefly freed from the things that will continue to haunt him forever more. Harry had been similarly lucky, visited by only the memory of a silvery white bird who refused to leave him alone no matter what he did and nested in his hair. 

He has to put on his pants to open the door, so he does, and then when he makes it to the door, it’s Ron. 

“Harry, we need to talk.” 

Harry turns to look at Draco, sleeping so peacefully he decides they’ll have to talk in the hall. He slips on Draco’s robes, so he’s not naked, and then gently shuts the door behind them. 

He’s a little pissed off at Ron still for not even having a viable excuse. Not even thinking of how Harry might have seen a proposal he hadn’t even known about. Ron and Hermione had so easily forgotten he was their friend that it burns. 

“What?” Harry asks, sounding annoyed and curt. 

“I asked her after Crookshanks came back. She was happy crying and sobbing and squeezing the life out of that ugly fuckin’ cat and she was so beautiful and so...so lovely. I didn’t have a ring yet, hadn’t even really thought about doing it before, but I sat beside her and I just. I asked her. As we held that ugly cat. We didn’t mention it to you because you were obviously dealing with your own shit and we didn’t want to add to it.”

Or not dealing with it. Harry’d just sort of ignored it and hoped it would go away. Doesn't make up for the fact that Ron didn't tell him afterwards and neither did Hermione. 

“I know now that we were wrong to do that, but you blocked everyone out, mate. You didn’t want to hang out with us. You didn’t want to talk to us. You just wanted to be alone or be with Draco. Wanted to smoke cigs and starve yourself and spend entire nights on the Astronomy Tower contemplating your existence. We watched you decay, watch you turn into this fuckin’ shell of a man, and we didn’t know how to save you from destroying yourself. We still don’t. I’m sorry we didn’t tell you, mate, but we just didn’t think you could handle it. It would’ve been just another thing for you to stress over.” 

He’s right, of course, but the principle is still there. He didn’t tell Harry. His best friend. 

“I know," Harry says. "I’m sorry for pushing you away...but I _died_ and I should’ve stayed _dead._ I came back and everything was different and so was I, you know? So I shut down because I didn’t know how to even begin to deal with the implications of that. I still don’t. But you _still_ should’ve told me.” 

“I’m sorry, mate. I hope you can forgive us. We just really fucked it up.” 

Harry stops to look at Ron for a second, look at the man he’s grown into, and he laughs a little. Light. How could Harry hold that against them when he's done worse and been forgiven? When Ron can still look at him despite being the cause of Fred’s death, the loss of George’s ear?

“You’re gonna have to make it up to me, then.” 

“Fine. How about I make you my best man and we call it even?” 

Harry smiles and nods, says, “That’d be a nice start.” 

Ron punches him lightly in the shoulder and laughs, too. 

“Glad to have you back, Potter. Are you coming to breakfast? Should I save you and Draco a seat?” 

“Oh, we’ll be down soon, yeah. Thanks, Ron.” 

Ron nods, smiles, and disappears around the corner. Harry heads down the opposite hall to the bathroom where he takes a piss and brushes his teeth. He stares at the sharpness of all the bones in his face, almost unrecognizable besides the twisted scar, with distrust in the mirror as he brushes.

When he’s finished, he heads back to his room where Draco still sleeps, curled up in the blankets like he’d be content to never leave. Harry presses a kiss into the crook of his neck, the jut of his shoulder blade, the arch of his nose, everywhere he can reach until Draco stirs. 

“What a nice thing to wake up to,” he says groggily, eyes still shut. 

“I made up with Ron,” Harry says softly. “I apologized, too, for being in my own world. For struggling.” 

“Well, it’s about damn time.”

* * *

Breakfast is a loud and cheerful affair. Sterling says everyone is talking about how well they did and how they should be so proud, like their worst fears weren’t shown on what was essentially live Hogwarts TV. But Harry isn’t concerned with that when Draco takes his hand and doesn’t seem to want to let go. 

He feels better today. Not perfect by any means, still haunted by death and the past, but okay for the moment. 

Harry eats a piece of toast with an egg in the center and has a whole delicious cup of coffee with a splash of milk. He revels in it, in the warmth and the taste and the satisfaction. He only needs a cigarette now to feel entirely himself once more. 

Hermione apologizes again, pleading her case, but Harry’s already forgiven her. He played as much a part in this as she did, plus she didn’t do the asking anyway. She embraces him and, this time, he has the energy to hug her back. It feels like coming home after a long, difficult day. 

Afterward, the air is lighter. The mail arrives and, with it, comes a small envelope held in the foot of a spotted black owl. It lands in front of him, sealed with purple wax and a stamp of a book. When he opens it, the letter is written in neat, concentric handwriting. 

_Dear Mr. Potter,_

_I am so glad you reached out. Hermione had said you might seek my council, but I must be honest, I did not think you actually would. Perhaps that is my bias peeking through or just a result of the media pollution from reading The Prophet one too many times. Either way, I am glad to help you on your journey to wellness. I visit Muggle London quite regularly, so perhaps we could set up a regular meeting? If so, please send a reply with Ullr with your availability and address. If not, we can communicate via owl or Floo if you’d like. I’m here to help you, so anyway you’d like can be arranged._

_Hope to hear from you soon, Mr. Potter!_

_Regards,_

_Healer Jillian Artemeus (call me Jill!)_

Harry is so glad she’d gotten back to him quickly. He scribbles out a reply with a quill Hermione had tucked into the hair she’d gathered in a bun on the top of her head to send it back with Ullr, the spotted black owl, who waits patiently in the sky above the table.

_Dear Jillian,_

_Floo is a no-go for me, apologies. That’s a remnant of the war, unfortunately. I can’t seem to get over the ties to my godfather and his demise. But mail or in person seems to work fine for me, though I don’t have a permanent residence in Muggle London yet, so we will have to meet somewhere public. A cafe or something._

_I rejected help for a long time, so this is kinda freaking me out, Jill. I’m nervous about this bringing back some worse memories I’ve forgotten about to add to the nightmares and whatnot. I hope it doesn’t._

_Thanks,_

_H.P._

Harry folds it into a square and slips it into the owl’s foot. The owl shoots off, fast as lightning, and is gone in seconds. 

“A healer?” Asks Draco. 

“Yeah. I think...Perhaps you should see one as well.” 

He’s nervous this conversation isn’t going to go over well. Worries Draco will yell or scream or even leave Harry where he stands. 

“I think so, too.” Draco’s voice is small. Unsure. “Perhaps I’ll write one later.” 

Harry gives him a hug that he returns, his hands pressing tightly into the small of Harry’s thin back. He can feel the pressure of Draco’s grasp like pain and worries there’ll be a bruise over the bones in his spine. 

McGonagall calls attention to the front of the room, so they break apart, turn to watch her. She wears golden robes today, the colour and texture of dark lion’s fur, with a red velvet lining. Regal as always. 

“Attention, students. The scores from yesterday’s test have been decided and will be announced shortly. Before that, I’d like to congratulate Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy on completing their education here at Hogwarts.

"It has been a tumultuous journey, full of tragedy and war and difficult choices, but you have come out of it as grown men. I hope you take the momentum from your incredible and successful journey through the Forbidden Forest and put it to good use. Your success, as well as the success of your fellow 8th years, is also a memorium. It is in memory of those who fought for you to have the chance to take your final exams, to live your lives. It’s in memory of all of those who died during the war and the final battle here on the Hogwarts grounds. Your fellow 8th years, who gave their lives protecting this place, will be memorialized forever in your success, so do something worthy of their sacrifices with the opportunity. 

“And now...for the grades.” 

She smiles while she lifts her wand and creates a shining lights display. Fireworks explode indoors in dazzling colours and rain down on them like rain drops. It’s beautiful and tragic and incredible all at once. 

Draco’s name is first. 

Draco Lucius Malfoy: Outstanding

Harry embraces Draco, laughing and smiling, because he fucking did it. He succeeded! Draco hugs him back, tears in his eyes, and says how he can’t believe it. It was well-deserved. He did save Harry’s life multiple times. The students cheer for him, so loud is deafening. 

Then Harry’s name appears in the same brilliant light. 

Harry James Potter: Outstanding

Perhaps they’ve given him the O simply on principal. After all, he did eat poisonous apples and was completely unaware of the effects. Then again, he did use multiple spells, so perhaps that made up for it. 

Either way, Draco grasps him and kisses him without fear of judgment and it’s the best one they’ve ever shared. Hermione pats him on the back and Ron is saying congratulations and the room is in an uproar for the both of them. Together. Two being bound for the future by three days spent in a terrible, godless place and tragedy. 

Harry and Draco. Outstanding, together. As it should be. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> leave me your thoughts please! :) it'd be really awesome to see some feedback!
> 
> (i prefer open endings in case you didn't notice! epilogues like the one in hp are a little too set in stone for me. obvi though hermione got an O in case you were curious)
> 
> (p.s i finished editing this just now, so if u find any flaws, let me know! i don't have a beta, so any mistakes are my own)


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